It's been quite a while, hasn't it?

What to say to you, what to say?

You were my childhood. I didn't think much existed outside of you.

But now here I am, almost 21 and going to college in some big town, or, as I've been educated, the proper term is "city."

There are over 100,000 people in the city where I reside.

And you finally broke the 4,000 person mark.

And now, when it takes me 15 minutes just to get to the grocery store, or when I get lost driving through town, or when I attend my church and never see the same people week in and week out...

It makes me think of you.

I'm not sure if I miss you or not.

People have ideas of what it was like to do life with you. They tell me they've seen "Parks and Rec" or "Gilmore Girls" and tell me "Small towns are so quaint!" "You must have loved it!" Or the occasional, "I could have NEVER lived in a small town."

But it was so much more than that.

You taught me about community. In the face of obstacles and hardships, you showed me what it meant for a community to band together to support each other. 2012 was a hard year for us, losing dear friends and losing our home for sporting events. But that didn't break us.

I remember babysitting for my teacher, my teacher being related to my friend, and my dad being my soccer coach. Everybody knows everybody or is related to everybody.

I remember those country roads - being able to name spots where friends have gotten pulled over by the police less than 6 months after getting their license, when they were trying to cut down on the drive through town. You know, that grueling 5-minute commute could be really tough.

You taught me that Friday Night Lights was a real thing: the fall weather, the electricity in the air, the band playing, the fans cheering. Football wasn't just a thing - it was THE thing.

I remember trips to the grocery store and seeing no less than twenty people I knew and having conversations with each of them. And then, of course, coming home an hour later and my parents weren't even worried.

I remember summer - full of soccer practices, reading books, and water-balloon fights, walking to the burger stand in town and wandering with friends because what else could we do?

I remember being able to name who lived in every house up the road as I walked home from school.

Have you seen Gilmore Girls? You know Stars Hollow? Well, every couple of episodes their town has some sort of quirky town tradition or festival. Their "End of Summer Madness Festival," their "Winter Carnival," "Bid-a-Basket Festivals?" We were a tad less quirky, but you get the idea. And I loved every one of them.

You gave me friends, friends I walked with from our preschool days, tripping over our own feet and stealing each others toys, all the way to cap and gowns and marching into the gymnasium to "Pomp and Circumstance."

In you, in my memories, you are the place of so many firsts - first dance, first crush, first job, first day of high school, first solo drive, first heartbreak - things that will always be associated with you in my mind.

Now that we've spent some time apart, I've had some time to think about you a little bit more.

When people picture small towns, they often see idyllic settings and people, Main Street USA, steeple churches, and quaint townsfolk.

And having spent 18 years in one, and almost three years out, I can tell you that some of that is true, but some is not.

I don't know if I'll ever come back to you for good. I've spent too much time away and I've grown a lot since the last time I was permanently planted there.

But it's good to know that no matter where I wander, or wherever I roam, you will always be a familiar pair of shoes that seem to somehow fit, and will always feel like home, even if you are never really my home again.