My Little Town

Been feeling nostalgic today. The day of the week I am most likely to go nostalgia-tripping through old photos and old music or do some webstalking of old classmates is always Sunday, for some reason.

I grew up in a little town that I hated, but it's been on my mind lately.

We moved from Lincoln, NE, where I lived from infancy until age 3, to this little town for my father's career. (We almost ended up in an even smaller town, but my mother had grown up in a small town similar to the one being considered and told my father she couldn't do that to her kids. Thank you, Mom!)

I wasn't aware of how small the town was, and what that really meant, until I was ten or eleven. Places that were bigger just seemed ... bigger, but the same, like with more stuff to do, but to a kid, it was just the same kinds of stuff and more people.

My sister and I walking home from the town library

By junior high, the town and I had declared silent war on each other. I went from being unaware of my town's size to being too aware of its size, hating it for its size and wishing I was somewhere else, and expressing this outwardly with my attitude and behavior and mode of dress. (And finding a few other like-minded individuals who felt the same way.)

Which is not to say I was some kind of juvenile delinquent. I did this in a very white, middle-class way, of course. I dressed strangely and took every opportunity to assert my individual style and specify my (superior, of course) pop culture preferences. If I wasn't going to be accepted and appreciated, I wasn't going to bother trying to fit in anymore.

I was, however, always a good kid. I didn't drink or smoke in high school (not that I had many opportunities, since I never got invited to the parties). I even used my good behavior, along with being smart and getting good grades in school, as a form of rebellion, to show them they were all "beneath me," and also because it meant that someday I would have a means of getting out of there. (I recognize now that my attitude was sometimes snotty and likely had at least a little something to do with the way people treated me.)

It was probably in my blood as well. My family were considered strange in the town. My parents were intensely private, with just a small circle of friends. Until I was well into my 30s, they lived in the same old house they had bought when they were poor as church mice, my father fresh out of law school with a wife and two kids already and hardly a pot to piss in. Long after they could have afforded better, they stayed in that same old house and continued driving their same old cars. (They did eventually remodel the home and my father got a wild hair when he turned 40 and bought a flashy Cadillac.) The town was small but had its "preferred suburb" area and social clubs to which the upwardly mobile belonged, all of which my parents rejected. My parents never joined a church (or even attended any).

(Yes, I've turned out a lot like them.)

So ... what's so terrible about my hometown?

Nothing.

Main Street

It is a typical small town in a Midwestern state. Its residents are traditional and church-going, socially and politically conservative. Its community is not diverse. It is hours away from even a medium-sized city like Lincoln. It doesn't offer much for young people to do--a movie theater and cruising the main drag are the primary teen pastimes. Its teens end up drinking at house parties or out in the country, and having sex at a young age, due to lack of any better options. Older adults still see movies and drink (but in bars), plus go boating, fishing and hunting for fun. The town has developed a huge meth problem since the 1990s. Its population has declined steadily since the 1970s, as it doesn't offer many career opportunities or decent-paying jobs that would keep young people around or attract new residents.

It's neither good nor bad. I realize that now. It just wasn't what I was looking for. I don't think I knew what I was looking for, really, until I was in my 30s, but I certainly knew what I wasn't looking for: a town like my hometown.

My sister and brother-in-law and nephew still live near there. They like the small-town atmosphere and feel most comfortable there. My nephew is in college but it won't surprise me if he returns there after school, or moves to a new town that is similar in size and demographics. They obviously want something different than I want and they enjoy the pace of rural life.

I haven't actually been back there since 2005, when my father retired and a small celebration was held (and he left the next day, to join my mom in the new house they had purchased several months before, in a bigger city). During the last five years, my niece and nephew even graduated from their small rural high school that is near there, and I attended but stayed at a hotel in a bigger city a little further away, just to avoid my hometown.

And yet, now that I don't live in Nebraska anymore and probably won't visit again until there's a wedding or a funeral, I find myself looking at the hometown newspaper website more often.  I did an earlier entry about learning my high school boyfriend's dad and my old babysitter had passed away, but the obituaries are not the only section of the town's newspaper that I read. Old family friends celebrated a 54th wedding anniversary and I saw the announcement in the paper and sent a card. I occasionally recognize a classmate or one of their children in a news story, but there are many names I don't know.

I miss the crappy old drive-in/restaurant that still has customers place their order via individual telephone handsets at each table. I've been craving the jiffy burgers a "rival" drive-in used to sell, and for which I have the coveted special secret recipe.

A friend posted Facebook photos of her visit a small town that still has a drive-in movie theater, and I remembered my town had one, too, until 1980ish? My mom worked there briefly when I was a kid. I saw Superman and Star Wars there, among other films.

A new friend who is a Montessori teacher got me thinking about my old elementary school, which took advantage of an unconventional classroom layout and created an unconventional (but very successful) teaching model. (In googling to see if there were any images, I learned that it was sold to a private investor and is being developed for mixed use business/upscale housing.)

Watching Freaks and Geeks again on Netflix reminded me of my 9th grade art teacher, who looked like the guidance counselor on the show.

So ... yeah. It doesn't define who I am, but that little Nebraska town is part of me. Simon and Garfunkel already said it better than I could, so I'll let them close this entry.