A Hometown Love Letter

My mom is in town today, and I snuck away to Panera under the guise of doing "work." I fully intended to do said work, but I needed to borrow a laptop from Tom (at work) first, so I found myself in a position I'm rarely in during the middle of the day--in the car, alone, with ample time and silence for my own thoughts.
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I have always loved Delaware. When we first moved here, we rented, because we knew nothing of this place and we wanted to get a feel for it first. It didn't take long for Tom and I to mutually agree that this is where we wanted to buy a home and raise a family. I've posted about my love for this little town before, but I'd be lying if I said I didn't have a "wandering eye" every now and then. A random episode of House Hunters, or a friend's announcement that their family is moving out of state, and I often find myself daydreaming about what my life would look like in Tulsa, or Boston, or Ecuador (true story, ask Tom). For a kid who claimed to be scarred for life by my family's interstate move at the age of ten, I sure have a lot of wanderlust.

The idea of staying in one place forever is scary to me. There is so much world out there and I want to see it. But my reality doesn't involve homeschooling my kids from the back of a Winnebago, so I find myself instead dreaming up the perfect place to root our memories and build our lives.

Some people look for great schools, or walkability, or cost of living, or access to amenities when they choose where to settle. Important? Yes, but wherever my home is, I need to be able to feel that place. I think that's one of the reasons that my childhood move to Ohio was so difficult for me--I never really felt Hudson. For me, home has little to do with what a place looks like on paper. I need a place that makes country songs with lyrics about hometowns stir something in me. I need to have my finger on the pulse of a town, to drive the streets and hear the city speak to my soul.
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Something about that twenty minutes in the car by myself today changed my tune, and I arrived at my destination with the urge to write instead of work. Maybe it was the combination of the sunny 75 degree day, the blue sky, the windows being rolled down, and having one of those perfect car rides where the radio keeps playing every song you like, as if the DJ has your personal playlist queued up. Maybe it was the scenery--the corn fields, and the pickup truck with the huge American flag strapped to its tailgate that turned into the high school parking lot, the open country roads, the older couple sitting on their front porch when I got back into town, the hometown ice cream stand that looks like that one straight out of "Friday Night Lights." Maybe it was the fact that its Game Day, and the excitement of the annual rivalry is palpable. Whatever it was, I found myself thinking, "This is it." We rarely choose the people we fall in love with. It just happens. And before we know it, we're embracing them despite their faults, and we're visualizing futures, and we're feeling feelings we didn't know we had. We didn't really choose this town. It kind of chose us initially. But here I am, happily looking past that run-down section of town east of Sandusky, and visualizing my kids as teenagers driving entirely too fast down Hills-Miller, and getting choked up listening to "Small Town USA." I can feel this place. This is home.