Just a Small Town Boy

"There and back again and again..."

The first nineteen years of my life were spent in and around the state of Missouri. True, I was blessed with the ability to travel to California and Alabama (including the states in between) but for the most part I stayed relatively close to home. Basketball camps, shopping trips, and vacations provided solace for this young travelling addict, but as I entered and exited High School I was ready for the next great adventure. Finally, at nineteen I travelled to Montreal, QC, my first big trip out of the United States, even though Montreal is only a couple hours across the border.
The next three years presented the opportunity to expand my worldview even further. I fell in love with Montreal, and spent two months of the next summer working there. I loved the big city lights, all the activity, and the seemingly countless new activities and new people to meet. My wife and I were married at twenty-one and twenty, and we honeymooned on a cruise to Tulum, Mexico: my first exposure to something truly majestic and historical. We visited the Mayan Ruins, swam at the most wonderful beach hidden by large cliff walls, and strayed even further from my comfort zone. This was the first time I was completely surrounded by the ocean, my first flight (we used to drive everywhere), and my first trip away from the motherland.
Then the world as I knew it shattered! My wife stubbornly insisted that we go backpacking in Europe after her college graduation. We both quit our jobs, our lease was up, and we stored our stuff in our family’s garage. A six-plus hour layover in Philadelphia did nothing to dull our excitement, and after a seven hour flight we touched down in London-Hearthrow for our next grand adventure. By some small miracle we found the flat in London where we would stay for a week. We were staying with a family we had never met before, who we knew only through my mother’s church. We cleared customs, called for directions, and hopped on a train to lead to the wandering which became the norm rather than the exception.
The next five weeks involved a lot of wandering, map-gazing, getting lost, and discovering some of the Western world’s most historical places. All of the busses, trains, boats, and trekking took us from London to Paris, Lucerne, Venice, Florence, Rome, Vienna, Munich, Berlin, and finally to Frankfurt. We flew back different people, and our world changed forever. When you travel, the realm of possibility expands, and the globe becomes your playground, work sight, and realm of responsibility. We developed new appreciations for history, point of view, consumerism, and most of all ourselves.
A couple years passed as we moved from Missouri to Denver and struggled to get by. We both worked jobs we hated as she worked her way through Graduate School. Eventually we were able to make a trip to Ireland. This reinforced my appreciation for small businesses and my disgust at the fast-paced low-quality retail industry of the United States. In rural Ireland shops closed at 6:00, had decreased hours on weekends, and treated us like people instead of a source of income. Small shops dotted the many small towns, and the hustle and bustle was noticeably missing.
The United States now holds a new significance for my wife and I. For nearly twenty-three years I took our country for granted, but distance enhances fondness. Now I always enjoy the trip back to the lower 48, but I desire to impact the world in a positive way. There are so many areas of need, and I feel seeing the world changed for the better is not just possible but now plausible. We have great responsibility as one of the richest nations in the world. In many ways we are still the new kid on the block, and our legacy can still be redefined.
The United States is still seen as the land of possibility by many in the world, but by many others it is rightfully viewed as the bully. The United States has a long history of using, abusing, and forcing our will upon the smaller nations rich in cheap labor, oil, or whatever other whim our people decide we need; however, we Americans are also known by our generous deeds in the arena of relief and development. In a way we are helping the world in spite of ourselves, so now the challenge is to put aside our greed and consumerism and help our fellow brothers and sisters of humanity who would and are dying to have the chances we take for granted.