When Everything Changes — Except For You

I have you ever left a city you love, a city you call home to return at a later date only to find almost everything that made that city what it was to you has changed?

Recently, I moved back to my hometown after spending a little over three years in Nashville, TN. My “hometown” isn’t a place to turn your nose up at. It’s not a one stop light pass through. It’s a major metropolitan area with a large university, many great neighborhoods, and a thriving economy. While all of these things still hold true, much of what made this city so great were the people who I shared it with. We were young, just out of college, had jobs that sucked, but we didn’t care because we had each other.

Trivia at a sports bar on Thursday nights, Friday nights you could find us downtown spending what little money we did have buying drinks and trying to pick-up girls, Saturdays were often a repeat of Friday, and even Sundays, if the hangover wasn’t too bad, church together. You felt like a Boondock Saint sitting there, knowing what you did the night before.

But now things are different. The city itself is actually better. The up and coming areas have up and came, there are now new up and coming areas, but those people who made it so great are no longer here. Physically they are. Their lives have changed though. Real careers, serious relationships, engagements, marriages, even talk of kids.

In my time away, I know I grew as a person, yet I can’t help but feel I’ve been left behind. What did I expect? For time to freeze while I was gone, and I’d return to the same people with the same lives? Uh…yes!