In the Piedmont of North Carolina, there is a town with a population of about 1,700 that spans about 29 square miles. This little town is my home. The place where I was born and raised and where my family has lived for at least 6 generations. It is where my roots are. I love it.
Many people complain about being living in a small town and I can understand that. Trust me. I get it. But at the same time, as I’ve grown older and experienced life outside of my small town, I have grown to love it more.
Where I’m from (and doesn’t that just sound like a certain country song?), the closest McDonalds is about 30 minutes away. If you want to go out on a weekend night, you basically have the choice of going to a friend’s house, bowling, or to a movie. Not a lot of options.
However, it’s a close community. Practically everybody went to the same schools and had the same teachers with the same type of education. There are a few exceptions, myself included (Early college, yay!), but we are all still pretty close.
My dad can hardly go out to eat without recognizing someone he knows. My best friend of 13 years goes somewhere and she knows everyone there.
That cliché of having a small army of little old ladies who know everything the moment it happens? Not so cliché. There is a group of not just little old ladies who know practically everyone and everything that goes on in my little town. Want to know why the firetruck just went screaming down the road? Give one of them a call. Heard something odd about so-and-so from down the street? I bet a certain someone can clear it up.
We know everyone because we have roots there. For many in my town, they can find ancestors who lived just down the road. I live on the same property on which my great-grandmother lived, which is just down the road from where my great-something-aunt and uncle lived. It is also surrounded on practically all sides by family who are still living, great aunts and uncles.
It’s a place with history. Sometimes that history can be a grudge that stays strong for many years, other times it’s how a community gained its name. It can be knowing who you went to school with however many years ago, or the ghost stories that have arisen and been passed down.
I love my hometown.
