My home city has a population of 152,871. It's not one of those cities where you know everyone in town and there's only one stoplight in the city limits. It's not a city where you can lose yourself among the masses on the sidewalks. It's a city where you feel as if you know everyone and everything, but there is always another person or place you've never seen before.
Before I make it seem as if I hate my hometown, I'd like to make it clear that I don't. Not even a little bit. My hometown has its problems. No one who lives there can deny it, but in no way is my hometown a terrible city.
It's a city that is trying to rebuild. It's a city that has helped raise a promising new generation. It's a city that is home to amazing people--teachers, coaches, parents, and anyone else you can think of.
Unfortunately, despite the pros that my hometown boasts, I've never really thought of it as anything but a goodbye town.
I don't think of it as a goodbye town because I see myself as "better" than the people who live there. It's never been like that.
I think of it as a goodbye town because I'm different. Not better, just different.
I look at the world with such a different perspective than most of my friends and family. Everything that I want, all my goals and dreams, wouldn't be possible without my upbringing back home, but those goals and dreams aren't something I can achieve there.
Leaving was something we all joked about in school. We'd always say: "No way do I end up here," "I'm leaving as fast as possible once we graduate." We said those and a thousand other empty promises to ourselves, but then as we got closer and closer to graduation, it seemed like I was one of the only people who still meant those words.
Everything that I wanted was elsewhere, with the exception of a few close friends and my family.
I'd always come back for my family, but once I left for college, I was gone, physically and mentally. I didn't completely change who I was, but I was finally able to be who I had always been inside. I didn't feel the need to conform to the expectations of people from home and I didn't have to worry about if I was going to be trapped in a place I didn't fit into.
It was freeing. Back home, all my goals sounded like wild dreams to everyone else. The older I became, the more I realized the expectations and goals back home were too low. I needed to be somewhere that pushed me. I needed to be living in a place where my dreams are only a year or two off, not twelve or twenty years down the road.
I've found a place like that in my choice of university. It's everything I ever wanted, and it has showed me the type of place I want to live once I leave. It's easier to breathe.
The girl I had to be back then has grown up, and that's okay. I can still appreciate everything that my town did for me. I learned countless lessons there that made me who I am. I know I wouldn't be successful without the upbringing I received.
I still love my hometown. It's just not my home anymore.
I said goodbye the day I left for my freshman year of college.
After having been back for an extended period of time this summer, I knew I was only visiting. When I left to go back to school this time, I didn't say goodbye to the town that raised me. I had already said it before, and I was too busy getting ready to say "hello again" to the place I now think of as my home.
Lady Antebellum described the feelings best.
"She's gone
But I still feel her on my skin
She's gone
But she ain't coming back again
This ain't nothing
Nothing but a goodbye town
These streets are only bringing her down
Gotta find a way to finally get out
Out of this goodbye town."
I've come to the realization that it's okay to think of your hometown as a goodbye town.
It doesn't make you a traitor to say it wasn't the right fit for where you see your life going.
Whether you hated it or you appreciate what it gave you, it's okay to understand you need something different. Leaving doesn't mean you are looking for more. It means you are looking for more for you. It's okay to say goodbye in the same way it's okay to stay. It's about where you feel at home.
Home is a place where you can feel fulfilled by simply being yourself. My hometown wasn't that place for me, and that's okay.
Goodbye towns aren't bad places, they're just wrong fits, and it's 100% acceptable to want your home to be a perfect fit. Don't let anyone tell you differently. They're just chafing from their own ill-fitting situations.
