Revisiting Childhood with Seattle on the Side

Quick note: my dear ol' Pop has told you plenty of what we've done in Seattle, but he did miss out the most important thing, me!!! (Woo!), so sorry if I leave out the daily agenda, I'm going through a bit of an identity crisis. Who isn't though?

We landed in Seattle on Saturday an hour and a half after we left and, unlike 4 years ago, I seem to have tossed my internal clock into a blender and now I'm leaking temporal gunk all over Seattle.  So far this seems to be very much the trend of the trip: strikingly similar but also somehow super different. Whether it be the titanic portions which are now herculean tasks or simply my personal highlights¹, everything has felt off for lack of a better word, like the mirror universe in Star Trek, if that helps. It's begun to make me wonder if perhaps the America I remember living in is some romanticised dream of the country it could be. 

~FLASHBACK NOISES~FLASHBACK NOISES~

Growing up in America, and Obama's America at that, I was sheltered from the devisiveness of this nation (I mean come on, my biggest issue was not being able to get to the ice cream shop by myself) and that has led me to be a staunch defender of the Good ol' US of A to all the Brits who see it as some form of liberty-addicted Mad Max Apocalypse. I always thought it was chronic cynicism desperate to focus on the failings of its gung-ho kid to avoid having to come to terms with its own failings². 

And whilst that's definitely at least a bit true, I'm back here in one of the most pridefully liberal cities I've ever visited³ and I'm finding myself getting distracted by the small things like the super-sized servings and alcohol possession laws, completely ignoring the actual hot topics like gun legislation and police brutality, let alone all the positives of this Oxford-of-America. (The composting and normalised lgbtq+ inclusivity for starters).

When I read through the blog of our transnational trip nearly a decade ago, I discovered that six year old me's favourite thing was an evolution exhibition in a museum. I forgot I used to be the science kid who would go round the table asking everyone what their favourite dinosaur was. Today the question is much more likely to be on the 2020 democratic nomination (prepare your answers!). I teared up today because I was on Air Force One. (Is jet lag an excuse?⁴).

Not to mention the fact that my favourite ice cream flavour is no longer fruit-based, I'm clearly a very different person to the kid who used 47 consecutive exclamatives in a row on his Yellowstone blog. (Look, see? I've only used six! Total!) And I think this has come up for me because of how close I am to a chapter of my life I thought finished and that's a little unsettling.

However Seattle's shown me the same kid inside: my jaw still goes slack at the sight of the NASA logo, and planes are just as cool as ever. On the blog 10 years ago (yep still 10 years) Mum mentioned wondering if I'll ever stop being the obnoxiously comfident one in crowds and much to many people's dismay that doesn't seem to be the case. Not to mention how ridiculously loud I am all the time. Chris will attest to that one I assure you.

I think a lot of this is surprisingly similar for the USA too. The train ride into Seattle was filled almost entirely with me pointing out all the school busses, Ford pickup trucks and the rest of quintessential America we drove past. There were so many Proustian Rushes it became more of a Proustian Tsunami.

So to summarise the USA: similar but also very different, and I appear to follow suit.

Not to mention the whole UK/USA frenemy shtick is as confusing as ever, even if they definitely have nicer skyscrapers.

Seattle is lovely by the way.

¹Definitely the adorable dogs and the owners who smile back, Air Force ONE. THE AIR FORCE ONE. AHHH. Oh and the Space Needle. Not at all terrifying. Nosiree.

²Admit you would see that film.

³pun intended.

⁴ Also pun intended. D'you know what? All the puns are intended, let's just set that up as standard. There'll be a lot of 'em.