The town with four stop lights

Posted on | July 23, 2010 | No Comments

Don’t forget to enter the Pear Tree Greetings Giveaway (ends tonight) and the My Vintage Baby Giveaway & Trunk Show (ends 7/31).

Hey y’all! Things are still going well in The Osborne Household and I will be back “blogging in full force” next week. I still have a couple of more guest bloggers to take us through the end of the week.

Today’s post is by my friend  Krista. Her blog, Not Mommy of The Year,  is hilarious & honest. As a blogger, she explores some really great topics that make us all feel a little better that we are not perfect.  As a person, it doesn’t get much better than Krista. She is always there to send a friendly email of encouragement and I’ve come to really adore our friendship. I hope you guys love Krista as much as I do!!

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OK, wow.  This was harder to write than I thought.  When Joanna asked me to write on the topic of what “Home means to you” I thought it would be easy.  I thought I could write about how we built this house while I was pregnant and I dreamed of bringing my baby home.  Or, I thought, I could write about the house I grew up in and the memories it holds even though my parents sold it a few years ago.  But none of that felt sincere.  Because while, this is my home now and that was my home then, it’s still not quite what I think of when I think about “home”.  So, here’s my take on it….

I left that town and swore I’d never go back. With four stoplights, three restaurants and a brand-new WalMart there wasn’t enough for me.  Not enough excitement, activity or opportunity.  Small town charm meant small town gossip and my mom finding out where I was when I promised to be somewhere else.  And I hated that.  Hated the whispers, hated the driving around with nothing to do on a Saturday night and hated being so far from decent shopping

I was 17 and headed for college.  I’d spend two years at a Penn State branch campus and move on to University Park.  There I found that a big college town could be much like a small country town and yet, so very different.  Walking down crowded streets could be very lonely.  Not trusting people could lead to not forming close friendships.  And, working hard to pay the bills could lead to sheer exhaustion that kept me from hitting parties (and probably out of trouble.)

Then, home for a weekend over the summer, there was guy.  And I started to see my hometown a little differently.  I saw it as comfortable and welcoming.  I saw it as peaceful and quiet.  And I drove home every chance I could.  When I graduated, I moved back for a few months.

Until a few months later, when I packed my things and swore I’d never go back.  Home represented heartbreak and distrust, gossip and disillusionment.  That town was not big enough for both of us and he could have it.

Almost 10 years later, “that town” is still my home, even though my address is 50 miles away.  When someone asks what I’m doing for the weekend and I say “I’m going home,” it doesn’t mean I’m going to my house, with my comfy couches and my wireless internet.  It means I’m going to my parent’s house in the town where I grew up.

It’s the place where I spent summers at the county fair, touring the softball fields and babysitting my cousins.  It’s where I learned to drive, had my first kiss and drank my first beer.  It’s where I can still drive by the house my parents sold five years ago and think, “that’s MY house.”  It’s where I can run into WaMart and not lock my door.  Where people remember me as Scott’s niece, Vaughn’s daughter or Rachel’s sister and know my daughter’s name because one time, my mother showed them a picture of her.

It’s where holidays bring too many aunts, cousins and grandparents for one house and something always ends up spilled on the floor.

It’s not where I met Craig, where he proposed or where we got married.  And, it’s not where my daughter lives or where she was born.  But, as cliché as this sounds, it’s where I became the person I am, it’s where I started the path that led me to him and to a life I cherish.

It’s where my family lives.  And that’s what home means to me.

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