The Hometown That Reclaims Its Own

I thought that I had escaped the draw of B-town. After years of moving out and returning, it has now been nearly ten years since I last called it home. Then I found myself there last week to take pictures for this challenge. So regardless of the circumstances and the why behind them, B-town always finds a way to bring you back home.

Don't get me wrong, my hometown is a very special place to me and anyone that has ever lived there. I mention the "draw" as it's something that the residents fondly speak of as some kind of local legend. It predicts that anyone who leaves will eventually return, most due to a homesick nostalgia and the rest because of circumstances beyond control. I experienced this legend personally several times during my late teens and twenties, as I frequently returned with a longing to be in close proximity to the memories and magic that it had always symbolized to me.

I spent my entire childhood and my young adulthood in B-town. It's a community with a population under ten thousand conveniently located a short drive away from several larger communities. So it is the kind of town where nearly everyone knows everyone else, and until I learned to be careful and clever, my parents always knew what I had done before I even made it home.

One of the most significant locations to my childhood experience in B-town was none other than the public city park. The park offers some of the most beautiful scenery that B-town has to offer. Located down in a deep valley, it is home to a river and dam, playground equipment, and several stone picnic tables. When I was growing up, I remember that every time I was in the park on a weekend, there would be some kind of party going on down there. Whether it was a child's birthday party or a family reunion taking place under the large pavilion, it was rare to see the park empty, unless you were there at night.

I would often end up in the park at night with my closest friend and the inspiration that caused me to begin to write. She was a brilliant poet with the most aesthetic handwriting I had ever seen. We always sat in the middle table of a set of three stone tables, the only set of three that existed down there. At times we would stop there to enjoy a fountain drink or cappuccino, or just to write. One of the fondest memories I have is being down there with her on a night in June where the entire park was covered in fireflies, which was truly a magical and miraculous sight.

A river ran through the park which was quite convenient for the many fishermen that lived in B-town. I never did much fishing, but I loved to go beyond the fence that was designed to keep people safe from getting too close, and climb down to a place right near the dam. It was secluded enough to keep me from ever being caught down there, and it had a close up view of the most awesome waterfall that would form when the town had just received enough rain. In fact, approximately every ten years B-town will get so much rain that the river will flood the entire park. When I was fifteen, I remember walking down there against the advice of many warning signs, to witness a deluge of water raging across the ground with the look of whitewater rapids. Later that same day, a boy was swept away by the current and rescued by the fire department as he clung to a tree which caused all of us to take the warnings a lot more seriously.

Near the river is a large concrete structure that we referred to as "The Hill." For decades, teenagers had spray painted graffiti on it and every so many years, the city would paint it to cover it all up. The many layers of paint caused it to have an extremely slick texture, so as children we would often squat down and slide down the hill on our shoes. We started sliding down on our rumps, but after some stern scolding from our mothers for ruining our jeans we proceeded to wear out the soles of our shoes instead.

When my crowd and I aged to teenagers, we stopped sliding down the hill and joined the tradition of leaving our own spray painted mark on the historic hill. I say "historic", because the local legend says that the hill was built to seal off the entrance to a cave that led to tunnels that stretched as far as the other side of town. A boy scout troop was the last group to ever enter, as one of the scouts wandered off and died down there. I wasn't always sure I believed the legend, until I found out that my uncle was part of that troop. He was really young, but vaguely remembers that expedition.

At the peak of the hill stands a statue of a Native American that is fondly known as "Friend." The statue is not the original statue that once stood there, however. A recent class of graduates raised money throughout their days in school for a long term project of recreating the statue of Friend. The original had been stolen by a rival school and supposedly dumped into one of the bodies of water that bordered B-town. I have always understood that it was the football team of the rival school that perpetrated the theft, which is not surprising to me considering how serious a matter that high school football is in this town. More on that later.

Across the street from the hill stands the local public swimming pool. This is the same location, but not the same exact pool that I grew up swimming in. It was remodeled ten or fifteen years ago and to be fair, it needed to be. The floor of the pool had several cracks in it, and even a long winding line that spread clear to the other side. But we always had fun with it, inventing underwater games of following the cracks and the line and trying to do so without coming up for air. Not the smartest thing to do I realize, but hey we were kids. The original pool also had a third diving board, a high dive that's no longer present. I have countless memories of observing and performing tricks from that high dive, not to mention the memory of my first jump as a small child where I landed on my swim instructor. Ah, good times.

Interestingly, B-town is home to two lakes, which we referred to all so unoriginally, the old lake and the new lake. Above is a picture of the new lake, as I'm not sure that the old one is even available to the public anymore. I find this to be a shame, as I have so many memories of tagging along with my peers on late night fishing trips that were most accurately described as opportunities for teenage mischief. It was convenient since the old lake was secluded and provided for much more privacy. The new lake was so open and exposed that it was more appropriate for swimming, boating, water skiing, and even an annual fireworks show. However, there were a few years there where we referred to it as "The Big Hole in the Ground" since B-town was in a drought and the entire lake had dried up, leaving only a handful of puddles in the middle.

Another place that holds fond memories from my childhood is one of the oldest restaurants in B-town: The Grill. Some of the best memories that I have of my late father took place there. Dad enjoyed having coffee and flirting with the servers, and I enjoyed the fantastic chicken fried steak that it was known for. But that's not even the main thing that the Grill was known for. Local legend claims that it is haunted by a ghost, and the claims were taken seriously enough that several articles have been written about the phenomenon.

Another restaurant that has significant value for me was "The Cafe." I know right, so original. But this memory is not from my childhood since I was at least twenty before it even opened. During a financial rough patch in my twenty first year, I used to play piano for tips there. It was a "private club" that attracted a supposedly more sophisticated clientele that craved an ambience of soft piano that I was in charge of providing. I didn't get rich in that process by any means, but it helped with the bills and gave me my first experiences of performing in public. I'll never forget the first night that I played. It took at least thirty minutes and three drinks for me to overcome the stage fright and sit down at the piano. I struggled during the first few numbers, but then a good friend came to me and stood at my piano, telling me to look only at her. It had a calming effect on me, as it reminded me of the times that I had played for her on the piano in her home, not to mention she was easy on the eyes. The rest of the night and each night after went much more smoothly after she had helped me get over that first hurdle.

For several Friday nights from August to November each year, B-town might as well be shut down. You won't see much traffic on the roads and the Walmart and local grocery store will look like ghost towns. The high school football games are an integral part of the town's tradition and culture. Some of my earliest memories of my love for music were of the town's marching band playing its fight song to celebrate each touchdown and the various songs from its marching show during halftime. My brother was a football star so as a young boy I remember attending the games as a family to support him. To this day it inspires an intense feeling of nostalgia to sit in that stadium, feel the crispness of the autumn air, and to enjoy the aroma of the hamburgers being grilled behind the concession stand. Even after my brother graduated, we would still attend because by that time, my older sister was a cheerleader. I would rarely watch the game though; it was typical for the younger children to play in the space under the stadium. I knew that I could count on my each and every friend from school to be there, not to mention whichever girl I was crushing on at the time. It has been several years since I have attended a game, but the last time I did it was clear that the many traditions that I grew up continue to live on.

There are so many more memories and locations that I could share that, if I did, would cause this story to surpass the maximum length by multiple times. When I returned to B-town to capture these images, I was overcome by emotions and memories on every street I drove on and around each corner I turned. I refrained from snapping any pictures of the many private residences that hold special meaning to me, as many new families have moved in since I left and I didn't want to have to share my next story from the county jail (which I surprisingly have no memories of considering the various bone headed stunts of teenage mischief my friends and I pulled). There are so many tales of friendship; love, passionately reciprocated and unrequited; and of course of the usual coming of age experiences that were common in all decades, defiantly crossing the boundaries and differences of the generations. (Most of this occurred during the 80s and 90s). So although it was the challenge that prompted me to return, it was just a matter of time until the desire to feel close to these memories of old caused the legendary B-town draw to bring me back home again.

If you enjoyed this story, please consider leaving a tip. Thank you.

--Vince :)