Change Management

Like a hostile American in Paris, Princess Sparkle looks around Richmond amazed, and more than a little miffed, that people who share this very same planet get to live here. I planned this, she thinks. Yes, that I conspired with her father to birth her in New Jersey and then spend almost her entire childhood growing up in a place almost the opposite of this city of her relatives, ancestors and all cool people, past and present to have graced the earth. I, at least had the decency to choose to give birth to her older sister in a foreign country. You’d think Sparkle believed I saved New Jersey just for her, then whisked her purposely through Virginia, and set up home in South Carolina just to torture her.

We are merely visitors to grandparents and best friends, all the blessed ones who get to share this rarefied Richmond air with college students, theater goers in jewels, the homeless, sushi bars, vintage clothing shops, brick sidewalks, charming cafes, Ethiopian restaurants, and renovated old movie theaters. And glorious city clamor, that helps us know we part of something living, as we look out over a bustling park from the 8th floor window of my parent’s condominium.

Neither Sparkle or I can help but be aware, that in energy, this place is the opposite of where we live and will return in a couple of days. Where we live, even the good stores and restaurants are in strip malls. The ocean, for which our place of residence is known, is lined with monopoly hotels of concrete and steel. And in our suburb that is far from tourist revelry, anything more, different or louder than an occasional bark from a familiar dog, or wail of lawn mower gives reason to peek through blinds.

Frankly, whenever I’m here in Richmond and there isn’t a holiday to focus on, I feel as if my past flashes before my eyes. For no reason in particular and without meaning to sound morose, I wonder if this may be my last time here. I know now, that one never knows. I observe from a distance. In just a little over a 24 hours, I have seen:

the hospital where I was born
both of my childhood homes
the first house Sparkle’s father and I bought as a married couple
the church where we were married
the house in front of which her father proposed to me
the bicycle store where I bought my Schwinn varsity 10 speed and pink banana seat bike
the bakery where I used to buy fancy birthday cakes
two tall buildings where I used to work
the imposing, brick Georgian estate-looking building where I went to school
the combo historic building/bar where her father first asked me out

Everything looks the same, but different. Remember that last scene in Planet of the Apes when the Statue of Liberty is left sticking out of the beach? Not that there is a beach, or a Statue of Liberty here. But a huge chunk of time has gone missing without me noticing. When I think about it, this is exactly what happened, even though very little has even been knocked over, or destroyed.

A corner gas station is a Ben and Jerrys; an old pharmacy is a stylish coffee shop; grand homes on tree lined streets are now offices and museums. Old era department stores still stand on abandoned streets with facades intact, and are being restored and converted into structures that will hopefully be useful in the coming years. Behind their display windows that once featured animated and wondrous Christmas displays, ladders and paint cans abandoned just for the weekend hold promise.

Princess Sparkle sincerely believes that the house where her father proposed to me is for sale is a cosmic sign – one that says we’re supposed to move here, where things look perfect from this vantage point. As if it is up to us. Don’t you see it? I should listen here, she believes, instead of getting swept up in another decade of living in a place not of our own choosing.

The part of me that still peers in department store windows, looking for long-gone magic, is inclined to believe her, but knows better.

I cheerfully tell her, “Well, we’re here now, aren’t we?” Almost, but not yet fully believing it, I say that no matter how much we think where we are right now is all wrong, now – believe it or not- is always where it’s at.

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