66. First Day Back

We're back in the You Ess of Ay, my Dear Ones. It's...surprisingly not as strange as I thought it might be. There is a sense of creeping strangeness, like it might be more shocking the longer we leave it to simmer. But our return has been vastly buffered by being met and pampered by my brother, plus having a mostly empty yet immense house to lounge around in for a while.

This is an important part of the transition process.

And this one's Spenserian, yo.

Receding in the rearview, Paris waves

and leaves a thin patina on our eyes.

Not culture shock, but memory-based enclaves

that show themselves in bursts of varying size.

A gentle tether, loosely woven ties

that tug us less than thought we that they would.

But newly back, perhaps our ease is lies;

we have, the true shock, not yet understood.

For now, though, we'd relax here if we could,

and bask in Cackolack and brothers' balm.

This midpoint in resuming life is good:

the storm can wait; for now, the eye is calm

It's barely been a day since we returned.

I'll take this eye no matter if it's earned.