In My Own Backyard

I have yet to write any story, and certainly not one that will eventually unravel into a happily ever after, without a good portion of the plot devoted to home and family. I have lived on the south side of the Tennessee River, and just this side of the Smoky Mountains National Park for most of my life. I can count on one hand the times I've crossed the bridge in the last year. The house where I am raising my sons is just a few miles from the house I grew up in, which is just a couple of miles from the house my grandparents built in nineteen thirty-something, which is a mile from the house where my grandfather was born. And three generations of my family live under our roof, including my brother, who isn't going anywhere, and leaving me here alone with my kids and our mother! It's a big place, but most of the rooms go to waste, because everybody is always in the kitchen.

I have never in all the years I have lived here been into Kroger, or Wal-mart and not run into somebody I have known since grade school. My boys go to school with and play ball with the children of people I went to school with, and many of their parents grew up with mine. I was on facebook this morning with others from around here telling them how my boys roll their eyes when I start telling stories about growing up in South Knoxville. I know how they feel. I did the same thing when my father and grandfather told their versions of those stories.

My boys are still at the age where growing up here is not charmingly nostalgic. It's hard to get away with much, or have anything about your life remain private, when your mother runs into all your buddies' mothers at Wal-mart. They're thinking one day they are going to be grown, and they are going to cross that bridge, and never come back. I thought the same thing, and I even left the south side of the river for a short while. But, when it came time to decide where I wanted my children to grow up, I ended up right back on the south side of that river.

I'm sure there are other places just as beautiful, though I will say when those mountains light up with fall colors, you'd be hard pressed to show me one. I'm sure there are places where the people may be even nicer, particularly given how ornery we can get around here during college football season. But, the south side of the river is home to me, and many of the people here are family, whether we're genetically linked, or not. I guess that's what my dad wanted to give me, when he decided to raise me here, and I know it's what I want to give my boys. And one day, whether or not they choose to raise my grandchildren here...I'm laughing because I'm betting the chances of my boys telling me they are taking my grandchildren too far from me will be slim to none. I know they will have wives, but I'll deal with them when the time comes. Anyway, no matter where my boys end up, I'm betting their kids will be rolling their eyes when their fathers tell them stories over and over about growing up on the south side of the river.

I can't imagine a happily ever after being found anywhere but at home in a crowded kitchen!