Living in a Scrapbook

Have you ever returned to live in a place where you've lived before?  Big Man and I went to college in the town to which we just moved.  As did 45 other members of our immediate and extended families.  Yes, you read that right: 45! (And that's only the ones off the top of my head, without asking those who'd know of more!! I couldn't begin to count the friends!)

I grew up hearing their college stories, and then Big Man and I made our own college stories.  Some of those family members lived in this town for reasons other than college, and so I've lived with their town stories, too; now Big Man and I are making our own town stories.

In the month since we moved here, I find myself flooded with those memories, from generations of our family.  Someone we love bought a significant item at the store we just passed, or had a first date at the restaurant we just ate in, or snuck off to make out in the cornfield we just drove by (I'll never tell!).  I can't set foot off our block without being reminded of a dear one, and yet, none of them live here now but us!

It's like living in a scrapbook, and I'm profoundly grateful for our heritage, for the opportunities this place has brought to me and mine.  So now it's time to make it our town again, to add another few pages to the Stewart-West-Coleson-Rickard-Derck family scrapbook.