My Childhood Garden

My grandparents moved to this tiny town when I was about 4. When I say tiny, I really mean it -- there are 1100 people here. That's smaller than Seward, NE, and I've heard a fair share of people complain about how small it is there.

I've done a lot of growing up here.

My cousins and I were here every other weekend from the time I was 4 until...well, the every other weekend thing broke off as we all started learning how to drive, but we were still here a lot. Every other Sunday still was a family dinner, and naturally every holiday, too.

We owned this town as we rode around on our bikes, taking a few spills along the way. We took over the park to play baseball on the now overgrown and dug-out-less diamond. The creek overheard many of our heart-to-hearts. The play structure in the corner of the park was the first (and only) place I've ever run away from home to get to. We loved our pink piggy picnic tableuntil we were too big for it but broke it from sitting on it anyway. We walked around and hung out with the neighborhood kids here, playing 4-square with the cracks in the driveway as our line. We broke the big picture window with a baseball and covered the back fence with batting practice with paintballs sounded like a good idea (it wasn't). We climbed the roof when we weren't allowed to. We danced like fools in the backyard and made a restaurant in the basement. We drove to Florida in the van with our baby dolls in the backseat without ever leaving the driveway. We were heroes when we got to take turns on Grandpa's riding mower to mow the lawn (even though he didn't let us any more after Beckey hit the culvert and put the blade through the side). Everybody knew the pine tree was the first down marker every time when we played football. That pine tree we climbed was just another forbidden treasure.We grew to feel more like best friends than cousins in this town.

So I thank this town for a lot. I thank it for my love of small towns, my joy to move to one, and even for a few scars on my knees from falling off my bike. I thank it for a lot of memories from my childhood and for overwhelming me with the tears of joy that well up in my eyes whenever I come back to it. And I thank it for bringing my cousins and me so close together.

If I could say that I was from here, I would. I would claim Richmond over Racine any day. I would even pick saying I'm from Illinois over Wisconsin any day, too (and break away from that stereotype of being a Packer fan just for being from WI. Yuck!). I have pride in being from Wisconsin, don't get me wrong, but this town is my childhood.

I hope that you have a place or two that you can love like this, too. It breaks my heart to think there are some people who don't.

~"There is a garden in every childhood, an enchanted place where colors are brighter, the air softer, and the air more fragrant than ever again." [-Elizabeth Lawrence]~