Change Happens

Years ago I had left this place, but it seems it never left me. Even after I moved to other states hundreds of miles away, I could never truly leave. It had been the only place I could really call, "home."

The dark pink azaleas bloomed in my head and the sweet scent of the lavender-colored wisteria hanging down from the trees clung to my nostrils like their winding vines which refused to let go of the unwilling trunks of which they used for climbing.

And today, five years since returning to call this place my "residence," I am conflicted and fight the urge to flee from its pull. I look up and ask why? How did I get here again? It surely hadn't been in my plan.

But when I faced retirement, I hadn't planned on a divorce, either. I had planned on fixing up the land and property that I had inherited once I had retired, but living back in that small town? No.

I had spent twenty plus years in a booming Texas city with lots of traffic, lots of choices in restaurants, curb service groceries per my computer order. City life can at times be chaotic, but I knew if I was going to have to do life on my own, then I wouldn't be able to afford that lifestyle anymore. So I moved back. I miss the me that lived life there.

At the same time, part of me was intrigued with the history and memories that were still on every street corner of the all too familiar small town... Main Street...there were altogether two or three other streets which comprised the "town" at its center. And there was the train depot. I still hear the roars and the loud signals to give caution for us to get off the tracks. (My properties are adjacent to the tracks.)

On one corner there stands a new barber shop, but it used to be the drug store and malt shop that my mother worked at after school...Kirkland's I believe it was called. (It was said that Bonnie & Clyde robbed it, but for sure, the movie filmed a scene here.) Further down, there was the First National Bank where one of her sisters worked. They hired her because she had been the Valedictorian of her graduating class.

Just outside of town on the highway (before the interstate came in) was where another aunt and her husband ran a cafe. They had car hops who brought the food out on trays in case customers opted not to go in for a meal. (The same kind like in Happy Days.)

The post office (which hasn't been altered or updated since) had been built new in 1938. That was the same year that my uncle and grandfather had been murdered by a crazy man. They were buried in the town cemetery which was across from the "Old Schoolhouse."

I went to the big, old, red-bricked building (K-12th grade.) I had the same sixth grade teacher that my mother had in grade school. And at recess, our class would go down the stadium steps to get to the football field where one of my uncles went on to become State Champs before WWII. (My children would never know that school because it was torn down and replaced with the new one they attended for awhile before we moved out of state.)

They remember the house we lived in with a circle turn around and the neighborhood kids they played with. That house is still there. And some of those same kids still live and work in this town, with kids and grandkids of their own.

Today, the family plot holds the remains of two uncles, my grandfather and grandmother, two aunts, my mother, and my first-born cousin. There is room for two more. We (those left) aren't in a hurry to get there. I do visit the ancestors when I need a little love and some sound advice, though.

I stay busy trying to maintain what was left behind to the best of my ability. I'm old and so are the properties. It's a struggle. And now I am adjusting to the new and old me. And to be perfectly honest, that's a struggle, too.

My body is aging and doesn't cooperate with what my mind tells it to do. My ambition wants to fix this and that, but my pocketbook says, "no, maybe later." This project should have started years ago when I had energy and money, but no time. Now I have only the time.

Arcadia and I are still clinging to the old glory days when we were younger and life around here was a thriving place. Now we do the best that we can do, but the wear shows.

Change is inevitable. Living life fully is optional. Finding purpose is vital. Sometimes we have to laugh and just make the most of it. (No matter where we find ourselves.) Hey, there's no place like "home!" Just ask Dorothy. I suppose my heels got clicked three times and I didn't know it. Maybe I'll wake up and find out it's all been a dream, right?

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This is the April prompt from ViM...thanks Mother Combs :)