Why, you ask? My family and I moved from Dallas, TX to this small town in IL two years ago. My husband was raised here, in fact, we live all of four blocks away from where his parents live. I have had a very hard time adjusting to small town life. Being raised in Decatur then moving to DFW, I am a big city girl. Some days I am just like a fish out of water. That is when I have to remind myself of the positive aspects of living here. The biggest of these is my family. My mother was raised just a few miles away from here and her grandparents lived just down the road from them. This is Mom: cute, huh?
She moved away long before she had me but some of the fondest memories of my childhood took place very near to my current home. You see, when Mom and I visited, I was introduced to country life: riding in a combine, feeding horses sheep and goats, riding a 3 wheeler in the woods in the middle of the night, swimming off the dock at my aunts house and going to small town church for Sunday service. Most of my extended family still lives here and I know I am welcome to drop in to say hi any time. So, on the not so good days, when I would really prefer to go shopping at Stonebriar Mall for retail therapy or eat some fajitas at Pappasitos, I remind myself that there is life at both ends of the red dirt road. I just have to make a place for myself here. It isn't necessarily my red dirt road, but it is my Mother's. My Grandmother and my Great-Grandmother raised their families and lived their lives here, surely it is good enough for me.
