Monday, April 4, 2016

Familiarity

On Saturday morning I was out bright and early with my daughter running some errands and giving my husband some quiet time in the house since it's his morning to sleep in, and he often has some work he has to get done on the weekends so it's nice to give him a quiet space to do that.  This seems to be a pretty common routine for us on Saturdays.  We get up, she plays for a bit while I get dressed, she gets some breakfast, I get her dressed and then we run out to accomplish whatever is outstanding on our list for the week.  

As I was driving around, I was thinking about how much I enjoyed the familiarity of everything.  I know for some people, the idea of living where you've always lived sounds like the worst thing in the world.  I know some people desperately need to separate themselves from their home towns in order to figure out who they are, or find their place.  I know that there are a lot of people who would listen to me say that I've grown up and lived in the same general area my whole life and they would think about how sad and small my life must be, but in all honesty, I'm happy with it.  I think, largely, because what I do is not directly tied to my location.  I don't do the same things I've done since high school just because I live in the same town.  I've met new people.  I've done new things. I've traveled from this town across the country and even across the globe.  My life isn't small, even if my town sort of is.  In the end, I like the familiarity of the streets, and the fact that I can drive my daughter past my grandmother's old house if I want and show her where some of my childhood happened.  I like that the bakery my grandma took me to as a kid is still there and I can take my daughter to it.  I like that I can create and build some of these shared memories for my family because of where I am.  I like that I'm near my cousins, and near friends who are as close as family sometimes.  I like that on a Saturday morning, I can drive down the street and the sunlight looks the same as I've always remembered it looking that time of year, and there is comfort in that familiar feeling.  There is comfort in being able to embrace what you've always known and see it not as a hindrance or a thing that is holding you back, but as a space of comfort to come back to when you've pushed yourself out of that comfort zone for a while.  Sometimes that's a really nice feeling to have, and it encourages you to branch out sometimes and travel to places you're unfamiliar with, or do things you're uncomfortable doing, because you know there's always a soft space to land back home.

So, while I know some people might look at my life and cringe, I'm actually pretty grateful for it.

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