The wet, coastal breeze that shocks your face as you enter the small city of tourist shops and familiar friendly faces is enough to wake you up from that big city haze you've been drunk from for the majority of your life. Something about the crashing of waves and gabbling of seagulls filling your eardrums.

East Tawas isn't just a town you visit, it's a destination for the weary. It's home. It's a dark and foggy night. The rows of orange, glimmering street lights beam through the main street illuminating a path to the closed shops, restaurants and taverns. All the shops with a sign indicating the hours of operation are limited and no longer available past sunset. All is quiet except the local bars bursting with the local men and women of the town. Loud bellowing and angry arguments fill the streets that were once occupied by cars and groups of out of towner people.

Newman Street has never been so still. All that exists in the nighttime are the local frustrated drunks, a few restaurants with lingering locals, and the roaring lake. Lake Huron. As you edge closer to the lake, you feel the shift of the wind. A sudden sharp, biting wind slaps your face as if you've offended it by stepping too close. The lake had been admired by all who came to visit for years. It's iridescent blue tint, the clarity all the way to the floor of the lake. You could see everything from abandoned shells, to the slimy seaweeds. Now it's murky and ominous. All of the beauty has been destroyed over the years of continuous wear and tear. In the far distance, you can hear the crashing and you listen for more. Where are those pesky sounds of roaring traffic and the white city noise you've grown so accustomed to? It's not there. It's quiet. Too quiet.

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Wandering back to Newman Street the next morning; you walk aimlessly up and down searching for something. Staring into renovated shops, imagining what used to be. Once antique jewelry stores are now hip coffee shops filled with the millennial generation crowds reading the latest Twitter newsfeed. Shops that have grown familiar are now filled with trendy decorations, one of a kind clothing boutiques, useless novelties and such.

And then you see it. The one piece of your childhood that has remained after all these years. The staple of all your memories. The big, blue antique sign. "THEATER". It sends a million flashbacks into your brain, within seconds you're sent back to being a 13-year-old with a cluster of friends encountering a featured film for the first time. And then came back the next day to see it with the friends who couldn't make the Friday show. A two-room cinema doesn't seem like much, but for being a pre-teen, it was everything.

Leaving the theater in the nightfall, you get the all too familiar smell of garlic, Romano cheese, tomatoes, and butter. It could only be one place. The most active restaurant. And it's still awake at 10 p.m. The infamous joint is named "G's Pizzeria". This place was heaven on Earth. Serving up best steaming hot, bubbling cheese pizza, palatable pre-diabetic desserts, and the oh-so-tasty famous ranch sauce was enough to send you into cardiac arrest. The night is young, and so are you. Let the adventures begin.

Veering away from Newman Street, the same auburn shining lights illuminate the way to neighborhoods all alike, but distinctive. Walking by each lit up house you imagine the life that happens behind the windows. The elderly exhausted woman in her bourka lounger is channel surfing. The young parents chasing a toddler around with a stuffed toy. Not one window was the same experience.

Once you reach the destination you start to skew your eyes to appreciate your surroundings. The once brightly lighted path is now opaque shadows and moonlight. You climb your way up the steel bleachers, trying not to stomp too loudly. The diamond is gloomy, but the glimmer of the moon ignites the field. The dewy grass sparkles in the night like silvery glitter.

Taking a breath as deep as the lake, you know you're home.

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This is the feel-good moment. The streets have raised you. They've shaped your character. The encounters with the natives, and the long conversations with the best friends you've ever had all still linger in the drafts of wind that blow past you. Their laughter surrounds you and echoes into the stars. The lake swallows up the doubts you've carried with you and crashes the built-up tension and anxiety you've packed in. The streetlights tell the stories of your past, and the theater houses the feeling of friendship.