You can go home again...but, you might not like what you see.

There is something to be said for going home.  I am fortunate to still live in the same town I was born in. Not something that everyone can say.  I always have lived here and probably always will.  However, a lot of folks don't have the ability to go back to their hometown, for whatever reason.  I think it's cathartic if you do.  You've got to see that things change, people just like yourself move on, grow and evolve - just like the town. It's hard for me to see that since I live in my hometown.  It's like not realizing how big your baby has gotten until you don't see him for a weekend, or you look back at last years school picture... (We've all experienced that as a parent!) That moment you realize you want to grab on tight, in hopes they will always be exactly as they are in that moment! (Right?! it's not just me is it?)  

www.futurenostalgia.org



I have had the chance to visit my Baboo's hometown a few times.  I've met his childhood friends and their families.  It is quite different from my hometown.  It's nestled in a valley in Pennsylvania.  In Baboos mind it should never change! It's been 30 years since he left on a greyhound bus with nothing but a duffle bag and the hopes of a job in Ohio.  He hadn't been back in about 10 years when he took me the first time.  But the steel mills there were shuttered long before that, just after he left.  They are quite literally the heart of that town... or they were.

That first trip was enlightening for both of us.  I got to see where he grew up and put faces to the names & stories, and he got to share more stories and memories with me.  It brought us a lot closer.  More than I would have imagined.  It was a topic we had never had the ability to discuss on the same plane; to me his "hometown" stories were just stories, and the places were just nondescript places with nondescript faces. That first trip was a window into a part of his world I hadn't been before.  After all, we live in my hometown. He's met some of my friends, seen my school, my childhood home, etc... 

Once there I got the feeling that this town, no matter how big it got, no matter how many people moved in or out, the core of the town remained the same.  Its a working class blue collar town with a bar & a church at just about every other intersection and the people are as colorful as the leaves in the fall. They talk football (obviously it's Steeler Country) baseball, and hockey, attend the Friday night high school sporting events and support one another as best they can.  Somehow, I get the feeling I have another hometown, where I'd be welcome anytime.  This is probably why I've adopted this town into my heart, and care about what happens there. 

This trip was difficult.  They had begun razing what was the anchor of the town.

Old photo of the bridge & mill

current birds eye view of the razing, in the top of the photo you can see
part of the mill is left, the bottom is reminiscent of a bombsite...It's
quite sad.

(the above picture is just outside of town at Hinkston Run)

 That was hard to see.  I tried to put a positive spin on it for him.  And told him it was progress. It was hard for him to see the city he called home for so many years in such a disheveled and dilapidated state.  Between the steel mills coming down, and houses literally falling apart from lack of care it really broke his heart. The downtown area is a shell of it's former self with shuttered storefronts and businesses.

It really is almost impossible in some parts of the town to see what was at one time hustling & bustling areas. Some parts are just literal ghost towns, others are on the verge of demise trying to fight to stay relevant.  It truly is sad to see. I can't image what how I would feel if that was my beloved hometown.  I'd be depressed. Unfortunately these people are.  Maybe not entirely in spirit, but to some extent you can't be around all that and not have it affect you on some level.  I know we were there for 2-1/2 days and we were both affected by the surroundings of the city.  The outskirts, the mountains, the natural beauty is still there, mind you.  Maybe that's what anchors these valley folks to such a place? I don't know.   

If any city can make a comeback, this one can.  It did after the floods.  With the help of the people.  ALL of the people!

Johnstown, Pennsylvania, the site of a flood in 1889 that killed over 2,000 people,
was again hit by deadly floods in 1977.
 (Photo by Chuck Manula, The Tribune-Democrat Johnstown, Pennsylvania)
side note:  Baboo was in the flood of 77... he got out of his house on the second floor and into a rowboat.

Although those were different generations that rebuilt the city.  I'm uncertain if today's community has the wherewithal to recover, rebuild, and begin anew. However this last visit is giving some signs of hope.  A new park, a new building here, new businesses (albeit small businesses), the old shells of the mill coming down, they are all great starts.  But the city itself needs more than buildings, and finances.  The people themselves need to start caring again, collectively, about the town.  It's as though once the mills closed, the town slowly stopped caring, stopped doing, stopped thriving.  If they can successfully remove the blight (structural and otherwise if you get my drift), then maybe the attitudes will change again.  When the attitude of a community changes, so do the surroundings and the town can be returned to it's old glory in a new way and thrive again. I know it won't happen overnight, but like I told Baboo on this last trip, at least they are finally doing something!  

                
I so want to hope for more!  I'd love to see the downtown full of traffic, pedestrians, store fronts and businesses, instead of vagrants, the homeless, the drug dealers, sitting in the park just waiting.  I hope to one day see the various neighborhoods with freshly painted homes, mowed lawns, flowers; instead of skeletons of houses with windows knocked out, porches falling down, and weeds so high you could mistake it for an old growth forest!  I can hope for that.  I will hope for that!  I must hope for that, even if I don't live in that town. Because this town is representative and echoing what is happening in towns all across the country.  It must change, and it must start somewhere, and change starts with hope!