Tonight's Poet Corner: An Ode to Suburbia

An Ode to Suburbia
by Belinda Roddie

At the bus stop across from the coffee shop
and the McDonald's, I wait for the 101, and
I count how many times I can see my breath
when I exhale. Large, gray plumes trying to
fly without a body. It's below fifty in March, and
I'm not used to taking the bus these days. My
fingers twitch at my sides, like they've been
caught in an electrical current, zipping like
a cable car. Destination: No man's land.

How long has it been since I've seen a
familiar face emerge from those blue and
red patterned seats? For a city that seems so
cozy with its formation, with its population,
with its shtick of, "Hey, I remember you from
high school - let's flood our senses with IPA
and soggy fries and shoot the shit while bitching
about Stephanie from Spanish class." But I
don't see anyone from high school, or from
any of my schools, for that matter. My hometown
has a way of inviting ghosts to its reunions
rather than RSVPing the reluctant living.

I stayed here for twenty-four years. Now, I
stand at the bus stop like it's a distant memory.
Nothing about it looks the same. The lanes are
wider. Wooden benches were torn into splinters
and shipped away for better ones. But the buses
aren't new. They lurch forward like fatigued
dragons with their wings clipped. They breathe
diesel instead of fire. I'm eager to take the 101
back home - only to realize that I don't remember
what home is anymore. Home used to be

a ten minute walk away from a park with a
cemetery stuck between a gap in its teeth. It used
to be pink sidewalks and late night trips to
grocery stores and gas stations, watching trading
card stores close and open as new trading card
stores. It used to be Sunday mass, a bike ride
to school, chilly mornings and a moment in
eighth grade when there was snow on the hills.
It used to be hard cider and warm garlic bread
with family before we stopped eating spaghetti,
so we didn't make garlic bread, either, though we
sure as hell didn't stop drinking. Home was where
the heart was, even though the heart got used
to palpitations, to anxiety attacks, to screaming at
each other down the hallway, to hugging and saying
sorry and then slipping into the shared car, only

to cruise through a real no man's land, the boonies
outside town, where lakes grew as stagnant as
stone, and hills were tired and brown from drought.
We played music as loudly as we could and sang
along, leaving treads on a road that demanded
that we slow down. We didn't, of course, though
I wonder what would have happened if we had. If

we would have savored the moment more, or if
we would have simply made it back to the house
just a few minutes later. Honestly, time is a human
invention, and we get to draw our own numbers
and hands on each other's facial clocks. I don't

actually need to wait for the 101. I don't ride the
bus anymore. I haven't since I moved into a two
bedroom and bath with my girlfriend and sister. Now
my condo stares at the other cheek of the bay, and I
notice how different its smile looks from another
angle. You see the watery dimples in a new way. My
wife enjoys the sunsets. We didn't get to see those in
our old apartment, even while we watched the boats
pass by our windows. When I visit my hometown,

I still sometimes go back to the pub my brother and
I frequented on weekends, just for a pint and Irish
poppers, starch and cheese and jalapeño dreams
smothering my eager taste buds. I still get a hot
chocolate with my parents, the mellow aroma
of cinnamon and vanilla nestling in my nose and
staying there for the night. Warm smells. Everything
feels so warm. And yet everything is so cold. The
bus stop. The buildings. The air. All the breathing
bones and blood vessels of my own suburbia.