Coordinates — just latitude and longitude, merely numbers strung together on a blank page. Numbers that reveal a location but not a place. Not a permanence. Coordinates — numbers that have no permanence until meaning is placed on them. Until meaning forms what they are — what they truly mean to the people who have an attachment to where that coordinate comes from.

44.9152° N, 89.6135° W may just be a coordinate.

Just numbers strung on a page.

For me, it means Eau Claire, Wisconsin — my hometown, and right now there are so many things I could say to my hometown.

1. Thank you for showing me great music

In honor of Bon Iver releasing their new album, I think it’s past due to thank the town I grew up in for showing me great music. Thank you for enriching my soul and my mind with alternative beats, local lyrics and a vibrant music scene. Thank you for looking past the diversity of our town and bringing us together through song and heart. There’s a certain beauty in that. A certain togetherness.

2. Thank you for all the personal hideaways

When I was at the lowest of the low, or my highest high, thank you for the little hiding places. Thank you for the forested hideaways where the only thing that matters in the moment is the wind through the trees and the crunch of the leaves beneath your feet. Thank you for the secret study spaces of complete silence and solitude. Most of all, thank you for keeping me sane.

3. Thank you for roads I can actually navigate

Living in a new place becomes a lot harder when you don’t entirely know how to navigate it. Thank you for the navigable roads. Thank you for the little shortcuts, the stop signs where I can (questionably) stop all the way, the gravel roads that make for an adventurous ride. Thank you for having generally flat roads…you are completely underappreciated, especially in the winter.

4. Thank you for showing me my best friends

Time and place shape everything about our lives. Had I not grown up where I did, I’m not entirely sure I would have the fantastic friends I have today. Thank you for the childhood friends that turned into sisters, the middle school pals that are my best buds, the teammates who are now an extension of me. You are loved, forever and always, and the only person to thank is the place that brought us together.

5. Thank you for forever being home

Time passes, people change…but you never do. No matter how much time goes by I can come back, find those little idiosyncrasies I loved about you and enjoy them all over again. But deeper this time. I can drive on the roads that are ingrained into me. I can listen to the song that takes me back to a specific memory in the city. I can run on the same trail for six years and never lose interest in it. You’re one special place, and I couldn’t have truly lived without you.