Speaking of [company]. It occurred to me one day that my commute to their office was like traveling back through time. From Cambridge, through different sections of Boston to Dorchester, like flipping back through pages of my history.
- Kendall Square, where I worked at that one place;
- Back Bay, where I worked at that other place;
- Past Berklee, where I temped in the 90s and (famous personal anecdote alert) saw Melissa Etheridge’s social security number;
- Symphony, where I worked before that (we’re back in my 20s now), in the office that was a converted bank and there was no HR;
- That corner between Washington and Harrison that some mornings smelled exactly like being dropped off at camp when I was 8. I hated that camp, the smell stapled irrevocably to a sense of I do not want to be here.
At each layer my associations/memories of my life during those periods went from happier or at least balanced to darker/more unhappy/resentful. This was perhaps my body or the universe telling me something about the place I was commuting to. But at no point during the commute was I reminded of any period in my 30s or my teens so it was an imperfect metaphor.