I just got back home earlier this week from a quick trip home to Kansas. I do consider Kansas my home state. Although my father was in the military for my entire childhood, he was stationed in Kansas longer than anywhere else. And I graduated from high school there, headed off to college and even my first job as an adult was in Kansas. In fact, I lived there for over 25 years. So, I consider it home, even though I left there over 14 years ago.
It was such a good feeling to cross that state line into Kansas and drive through Wichita, on through the Flint Hills and up the highway all the way to Kansas City. Yep, Kansas City, Kansas City, here I come…that’s was I was humming as I drove down the highway. I could feel myself relax as all those familiar places flashed past my car windows. I stopped off in Matfield Green to see the Knute Rockne memorial, in Emporia to see Soden’s Grove, in Olpe to see the Olpe Chicken House, and in Leavenworth, I saw the federal prison, the front gate to Fort Leavenworth and the Missouri River.
Kansas may not be that huge tourist destination, but folks don’t know what they’re missing. People in Kansas are warm and friendly, helpful, open and welcoming. And it’s kind of like stepping back a bit in time when you stop to see the beautifully old-fashioned town squares in the small towns that line highway 40 or highway 50. Nothing is as much fun as hanging out with friends at the local high school football or basketball game and then heading over to the mom & pop hamburger place and visit with everyone some more.
This trip, I went back to my college homecoming and met up with friends from my college days that I hadn’t seen in about 30 years. It was so much fun! How do so many people not age??? They looked like they did in college and I would have recognized most of them anywhere. And now, I’m looking forward to next year. They say you can never go home again…well, I don’t know who “they” are, but they are WRONG! You can go home again. I did. And it was wonderful.
“You can’t appreciate home till you’ve left it, money till it’s spent, your wife till she’s joined a woman’s club, nor Old Glory till you see it hanging on a broomstick on the shanty of a consul in a foreign town.” ~ O. Henry Porter
The saying you can never go home just isn’t true!
You’re missed.
Thanks! I’ve been side-tracked with work, work-related activities and traveling. But I’m back…and am trying to get re-inspired.