The Town

There was no rush-hour in the Town.  It had a rush-ten minutes. Automatic opening doors opened slower. People from the City were forever walking into them.  People just walked slower in the Town. They talked slower, too.  The heat must have done that.  You could take a deep breath and break a sweat.  People knew your name. They also knew your business.  Get up in the middle of the night and your neighbor would ask, “were you sick? Your bathroom light was on at 2 a.m.”

When you lived in the Town, you didn’t need voter I.D.  The lady at the polling place knew your mama.  “Who’s your mama?” That was the first question you were asked when you came to the Town.  The second one was “Where do you go to church?”  It wasn’t hard to find one of those.  There was a church on every corner. The tallest object in town wasn’t a building. It was a water tower.

Mosquitoes landed at the local airport. So did crop dusters.  Data on the internet traveled slower than gossip on the front porch. The information superhighway was the path between Molly Grable’s house and her neighbors. People elected politicians just so they could talk about them.  Children left to go to college. But eventually they came home to raise their families. The local schools succeeded because the parents cared. And high school football? It was the second religion in the Town.

There were challenges. The big box store opened on the bypass and the local businesses were under siege. The local hospital was having funding problems. And the mayor was always concerned about the tax base.  But like the giant oaks next to the courthouse, the Town would survive. It would always be there.  It had deep roots to keep it alive.

Yes, it was a small town. But life in the Town was anything but small.