South Williamsport, Pennsylvania, my hometown, is ice cream stops to Dairy Queen after Little League games in the summer. It's walks on the river walk in the spring. It's the sound of, "Logan Wein for the extra point attempt," on the public address system on Friday nights at football games in the fall. It's walking up the hill in the winter to go sled riding down the high school hill. The seasons do not define my hometown, my hometown defines the seasons. The seasons just wouldn't be the same anywhere else in the country.
I had the opportunity to live in Bethany, Oklahoma for five months. Bethany was inside in the air conditioning all summer. It was, "Find a basement or a safe shelter," in the spring. Those are the seasons I experienced while living there, but I was told by my fiancée and her family that the weather was completely unpredictable. I defined the seasons in Bethany by the weather because I never felt a personal connection to the seasons.
After living in Bethany for five months, there was no doubt about it: when I think or talk about South Williamsport, I get this undeniable feeling of home. When you are away from such a close, community oriented town, you seem to forget about the bad stuff that goes on there and focus on how great it really is.
South Williamsport is the town I grew up in. I didn't realize how much I loved it until I left it and came back. Don't get me wrong, there are things about South Williamsport that I dislike, but there are things that a person dislikes about any place. At the end of the day, I will always feel like I belong when I am there.
In high school, I never claimed to hate my hometown, but unlike most people in South Williamsport who stay here the majority of their lives, I left my hometown when I was 20. I left behind my roots and what I knew as home. And after five months of being away, I had experienced enough of Oklahoma to know that it is not a place that I could see myself living in for a long period of time, or a place where I would want to start a family. The education system is lacking, public transportation is lacking, sidewalks rarely exist, people in South Williamsport seemed friendlier for the first time in my life and I never felt a closeness.
If I had grown up in Bethany, Oklahoma, I am sure I would see things differently, but I didn't and that is why I love my hometown so much more. I learned to value everything in South Williamsport a lot more.
To wrap things up, Bethany can't be defined as home. I made it five months because my heart had a home with Kelcie, but South Williamsport is my true home.
So this is my advice to all of you: if you are from a small town or want to leave your hometown, go for it. Everything we do in life gives us a new experience; whether it is a good or bad experience, they all help us become better people. By living 1,300 miles away, I learned a lot about myself and a lot about what I don’t want for my family in the future.
So I want you all to go and venture to a new place. South Williamsport, or your small town, is not going anywhere. It will always be there to go back to. Go to a place that you have never called home before and see how things go. But don’t you dare ever forget where you came from. If you want to go back home, never be ashamed of that. There really is no place like home.
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