Wrong Turn To Yesterday

"Hey. What's up, man?
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"Yeah, I Just got off the highway. How do I get to your place?"
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"Uh-huh, uh, huh. And a left onto 4th street? And then the second right? Got it. See you in a few."

What a ticky-tack little city. Not even a city, this is a village or town at best. And they all look the same, these little towns. I've traveled around a fair bit, but I'm definitely not, for a lack of a better term, "worldly." I've never been to Rio de Janeiro, or to Cairo, or to Tokyo. Hell, I haven't even been to Chicago. All my traveling has been to towns like this one. Towns exactly like this one.

Fuck. What did my friend say? Was it 4th or 5th street? I can't seem to remember.

These towns all have the same roads, the same stores, the same houses. Even the the same people. I've been driving in this town for grand total of 90 seconds now, and I can already tell you everything there is to know about it. Gas station? Three blocks straight ahead. Movie theater? Turn left at the next light, drive 2 miles. Elementary school? Go past this intersection and hang a left. Or a right. In these little towns it never really matters which way you turn.

I grew up in a town like this. Well, I grew up in two towns like this. I spent my childhood years in one town, and my teen years in another. My parents were offered a large sum of money for their house in town #1, some developer wanted to clear the space for a strip mall. And that was that, our house was torn down and we moved on to town #2. No special difference between towns 1 and 2, or between 1, 2, and the thousands of other towns scattered around. They're all the basically the same. I don't really have special preference for one town or another. But anytime someone asks me where I'm from, I say town 1 and not 2. Not that it makes much of difference to anyone, because no one outside of the region has ever heard of either town.

Hmm...something doesn't seem right. I think I must have passed all of the houses. The buildings are getting farther and farther apart. The landscape seems to have faded back into farmland. I must have gotten my directions mixed up. I guess I had better turn around.

I make a quick u-turn and start heading back toward town, but I start to notice little oddities. It's almost rush hour, but I'm the only car on the road. And I only drove a little bit out of town, a mile or two at most, but I've been driving this stretch of road for 5 minutes now and I haven't gotten back. The little oddities start to become big oddities. I haven't made any turns, and the road doesn't curve at all, but I keep passing the same landmarks. It's as if I'm driving in a circle. Cornfield, pond, row of trees, farmhouse with white mailbox. Cornfield, pond, row of trees, farmhouse with white mailbox. Cornfield, pond, row of trees, farmhouse with white mailbox. Cornfield, pond, row of trees, farmhouse with blue mailbox. Cornfield, small river, clump of trees, big red barn.

Where the fuck am I?

I decide that I had better turn around again, and I make another u-turn. This time, I'm not driving for more than a minute before I reach the town. But something still seems wrong. I could have sworn it was a pizza place that I passed, not this burger joint. And I know for sure that I didn't pass that small abandoned factory before. Is this even the same town I drove through? I have no way of knowing. Everything looks the same, but different.

I decide that I had better pull over and ask someone for directions. But before I can find a gas station, I find something else. Something completely unbelievable. I recognize this cross-street. I used to live on this street. I used to ride my bike up and down these sidewalks. I used to climb that tree on the corner. Before it was turned into a parking lot, my house was about ten houses down off of the main road. Somehow, a little piece of my hometown has found its way here. But it's the hometown of my memory, not of the present. This is pretty strange, I'm a little hesitant to turn off the main road. But I'm curious to see if I can find my old house.

My car has already steered itself there before my brain makes the conscious decision to move. I'm parked in the driveway, staring in awe of the house. Every detail is spot on. The little chip on the garage from when my father nicked it with the station wagon, the tear in the screen door from our dog, the clump of grass in the driveway that served as our ad-hoc free throw line in neighborhood basketball games. I'm surprised I remember my house well enough to notice little details like that. Or perhaps I notice these things only because I remember them. Memory is the only place they exist at all.

Do I dare knock on the door? Who will greet me? My parents, who would be almost the same age as I am? Myself at age six? A complete stranger? Should I even get out of the car? Again, I have no say in the matter. My feet have already marched themselves up to the door without any permission from me. My hand rings the doorbell, completely of its own accord.

As if on cue from the doorbell, the vision disappears entirely. I'm suddenly standing in a neighborhood I don't recognize, in front of a house I've never seen before. I hear the door start to open and a brief wave of panic rushes over me. What am I doing here? How will I ever explain myself?

My friend opens the door, and greets me with a bear hug and a smile.

"Sorry I'm a little late."
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"No, your directions were fine. I just took a wrong turn to yesterday. It's alright though, I'm back in the present."
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"Haha, yeah. I know it doesn't make any sense, but that's the only way I can explain it."