I have spent much of my childhood growing up in a small town in the Lowcountry region of South Carolina. This town, Garnett, is the physical embodiment of the phrase “the country.” Winding, unpaved dirt roads carved deep into the earth as if they were forged at the beginning of Earth’s creation. There are lush forests with towering pine trees and spruce trees, riddling the ground beneath them with pinecones and pine needles. The only buildings there is a post office, a mini mart, and an AME church. Every fall crisped evening, towards Thanksgiving, ended with wild turkeys weaving through traffic in the hopes of reaching the safety of the forests before the hunters’ dogs catch wind of their scent. My family owns a few acres of Garnett that …show more content…
The thought of leaving it never crossed my mind. I childishly imagined that I would live there for the rest of my life as the head caretaker of the stray dogs. Garnett was home. Unfortunately, my dream did not last long because of a job offering for my mother in Columbia. Of course, the move brought new anxieties that I had never experienced to my attention as I helped my mother pack boxes into the back of a U-Haul truck. How was I supposed to survive in the “big city” when I lived in a small town that no one has ever heard of? Will I be able to handle being around so many strangers and sounds after living in tranquility and peace for the first half of my …show more content…
The masses of people going into the stores astonished me the most. Garnett and the towns surrounding it are predominately black. In all of my years there, I have only seen a handful of white people and one or two Mexicans. The most diversity I was exposed to was through TV. I had always wanted to learn about other cultures but, the slug-like speed of a dial-up Internet connection and the one library in a nearby town did not have a significant amount of books blocked all access to any information on the topic. The close proximity and variety of malls and movie theaters made the usual forty five minute long car trip from Garnett to Beaufort obsolete. The libraries are filled to the brim with eclectic array of genres of books and the Internet is faster and more readily accessible. Animal control prevented stray dogs from wandering the streets and all owned dogs have to be licensed and spayed and neutered. The multitude of differences between Garnett and Columbia were a culture shock to me and took some getting used to. Once I did, I realized that living in Columbia has opened my eyes to a bigger world full of opportunities and diversity. Since moving to Columbia, I have visited Garnett a few times. On my most recent visit, I had a conversation with my grandfather. “Good to see you!” he said, “We haven’t seen you in a while. Do you miss it here?” “Very much
The informal language, creative word choice, and diction used by all of the characters in this story are true to the Southern Gothic genre short story style (Kirszner & Mandell, 2012). Southern imagery extends beyond the characters to the setting and language. As we read about dirt roads, southern plantations, “red clay banks”, and crops in the field, we are transported to a
It takes a lot to rip apart a town. It takes a lot to ravage a community, particularly one as tightly-knit as Ridgway, Pennsylvania. Nestled snugly at the southeastern edge of Allegheny National Forest, Ridgway’s population has dipped to just below four thousand in recent years, though in its 191 years of settlement, it’s never once been called home by more than roughly six thousand people at once. Its proximity to the forest attracts huntsmen and hikers alike, but unless one were actively looking for the town—the square mileage of which comes in at just over two and a half miles, total—it would be remarkably easy for Ridgway to not make a blip on someone’s radar at all. It’s small, out of the way, and most of all, quiet—a recipe for insignificance.
Growing up in small-town Pflugerville, I never imagined what life would be like outside of a "country" area - until I moved to Killeen, Texas. Killeen is a town full of hot-headed, military, city-slickers that clog up the highway like ants. Often, I think of times when I was younger - looking up at the clear, blue, open skies; the smell of fresh-cut grass always awakened my senses. Now, I look up and I see wires, buildings, cars, and smog. They always say "There is no place like home," and in this case, there are no two places that differ more than my hometown and the town I live in now. The speed of life, the buildings, and most of all, the crime rates are all very new to me. The world is like bowl of fruit, sometimes the taste of each point on a map can differ as greatly as apples and oranges.
"I missed you too. I’ve been counting down the days until I can see you."
“Can we talk about moving to Minnesota?”, my father would ask. “I don’t want to, ” I’d always responded. This lasted for four years, my father always looking towards the future, my future, but never willing to press me towards the opportunities he saw. I had friends, an expansive yard where I could play, take pictures, observe the wildlife, a quaint home in a quaint neighborhood attending a quaint school in northern Mississippi, and each time the question came up, a feeling of fear welled up as I thought about how different it would all be, really the complete opposite: a rural home to a suburban apartment, a school with fewer than a thousand students for grades K-12 to one quadruple the size, a world with friends, one without. Eventually, after my eighth grade year, I let in to my father and allowed logic to clear the emotions that
As far back as my memory allows me to recall I’ve always lived in the simply small town of Gurdon, Arkansas. Lacking in many of things including a grocery store, it is not necessarily difficult to assume the town is dull just by the looks of the uninhabited streets running through the heart of the city. Luckily with my seventeen years of being a local, I am able to understand that these false accusations just scrape the surface of the deeper aspects that actually make the town that I’m proud to call home so rare. Searching all the things that define Gurdon as home to everyone that has lived here, the Gurdon Light outweighed the others with my own experiences.
The rolling hills, golden with long rows of crops ready to be harvested, all cut by a winding white gravel road. On either side of the land, there are rusty wire fences marking who owns what, and red barns speckle the land. Dust kicks up by passing cars, and tractors, moving from place to place. Pootsville, the name is not on any map, but for the few families that have lived here for generations know the name. It is the area between three small towns, the nearest store is five miles away and all your neighbors are half a mile or more away. Everyone knows everything about each other; it doesn’t matter if you are five miles from them you are still part of the family.
I have lived all of my life in, Durham New Hampshire. There are so many beautiful things about the town I grew up in: the leaves change to brilliant oranges, yellows, and reds in autumn. In the winter, a blanket of white covers the suburban homes and small pizza shops. By the time June comes, most of the college students from the university have left. It is peaceful without them walking to classes, and playing volleyball on the yards in front of fraternity and Sorority houses. It gets lonely without them, and it seems eerily quiet without their chatter on the green lawns in front of dorms.
Smith and Fisher discuss the concept of “place.” In the Conclusion of their book they explain that the “place” in Appalachia is, for many who call it home, the place of the mountains (267). This does not mean that all residents would find mountains to be the most personally relevant depiction of place. It also does not mean that place is a physical backdrop or fixed territory. Smith and Fisher define place as a “collective product, experience, and possibility” (267).
I had grown up in a tiny-ish village with my Mother and when I finished high school, I had moved away to the city for college without even thinking twice. There were two reasons for my rapid move: I wanted to see what was out there and I wanted to finally escape from my Mother and her horrible choices on husbands.
As a child, I was fascinated by stories about a farm in Harrison County, Maine, where my father spent his teenage years. Being raised on a farm seemed more interesting than growing up in the suburbs. About a year ago, I decided to explore what living on a farm was like. To get to Harrison County, I had to drive on Route 334, a surprisingly easy-to-drive, four-lane highway that had recently been built with matching state and federal funds. I turned into the dirt road leading to the farm and got out of my car. It had been washed and waxed for the occasion. Then I headed for a dirt-colored barn. Its roof was full of huge, rotted holes. As I rounded the bushes, I saw the house. It too was dirt-colored. Its paint must have worn off decades ago.
Heaving, I place the last of the firewood I collected in the bus and select enough wood to start a fire.I place the stew from last night over the small fire while I warm up my hands. Above me I notice a large flock of birds chirping and screeching loudly as they soar across the sky. A herd of deer gallop past while a few rabbits peek out of their hiding. Watching these wonders of nature, I couldn't help but think of the differences between the wild and the city. In the city the simple beauty of nature is often overlooked or destroyed by modern society as people are often too busy running after their dream, jobs or a place in society. They forget to slow down, take a deep breath and simply enjoy life. In the wild it seems like I had stepped into a different world where there is no trace of modern society, just the beauty of nature, freedom and peace. A sudden gust of wind brings me back to the present. Standing up I extinguish the fire and get ready to
“Oh my god I haven't seen you in so long. How are you?” He said
“Hey, how have you been? I haven’t seen you around in a while, what have you been up to?”
It was a very cold November day. I was walking down the streets of my home tome, Babylon New york. As I walk down the street littered with fancy BMWs and Mercedes, I cant help but feel out of place stepping out of my 1997 Jeep that has two working windows and a busted tail light. This is my home town but sometimes it can make you feel like you don’t belong. As I continued my walk down the street I could see that the leaves on the perfectly groomed trees were beginning to turn all different shades of orange and brown. All the shop windows were decorated for thanksgiving, but some still had a left over jack-o-lantern or two taking