Small Town Girl

Just a small town girl.  But there the similarities between the song and my experience part ways.  I did not live in a lonely world – I lived in a world of friends who became family.
A little West Texas town with no traffic light, an old time drug store, a handful of cafes and coffee shops and a few mom and pop businesses – that was and is home for me.  While the town has transformed a bit with the addition of one caution light in the middle of town and the demise of the old family drug store, there are new cafes and coffee shops which have been born.  But the people….the people of my youth….those are the same.
It is hard for people who never had the Stinnett Rattler experience to understand fully just what it means to those of us who lived it and loved it.
It was a life of tradition and pride.  It took dedicated people who wanted that to continue so that decades of kids would know what it meant to be a “Rattler.”  It is a testament to their dedication to the preservation of a heritage that recently in a room of over 200 people almost everyone raised their hands at the question “who took typing from Mrs. D?”  The only people who couldn’t claim that honor were spouses of ex-students.  Imagine what that is like to know that the teacher who taught your parents typing, taught you and your children and maybe even your grandchildren.
It was a life of safety.  We were blessed with a lawman who loved the kids of his town and took those extra steps to redirect their path when they stumbled and who also gave them a safe place to hang out and be kids.  His goal in life was not to punish us for trouble we caused or stepped into – it was to prevent us from ever going there in the first place.  But if we did, he brought us back with wisdom and love.  My hometown was a place that any adult had the right AND the responsibility to jerk a knot in our tail when we were out of line.  I never had one moment when I was afraid or felt in danger.
It is true that it was also a life of many secrets behind closed doors.  It was truly the definition of that old TV tagline “there are a million stories in the naked city.”  However, the only laundry aired in public was of a cloth nature.  We just didn’t talk about our problems or issues.  Sometimes I think that might have been the best lesson of all to learn.  In not dragging our stuff around for all to see, we learned to handle things, make decisions and most of all to be resilient, resourceful, and wise.  Some of us learned hard lessons and from the ashes of bad experiences most of us built better lives.
Once, someone told me they had always thought I had a “charmed” life.  It made me laugh because it was anything but charmed.  But, for whatever might be clouding the day for me I always could escape into the streets of Stinnett and the halls of Stinnett High where I forgot whatever it was that needed forgetting.  It was this place that taught me laughter would serve me better than tears and I try to reward that teaching by giving back laughter and happiness wherever I am and especially if I go “home.”
It hurts me to see buildings falling down, lots overgrown, landmarks gone and replaced.  Of course it does because in my dreams I can still walk those streets and see what I saw then as clear as day.  It even hurts a bit to know that the Rattler traditions and heritage have been replaced by a great Comanche nation who are building their own history and memories.  And good for them!  But, I know that the heart of my small town still beats inside the chests of the many who chose to stay and make it their home.  I know this because when I listen to their stories they are much the same as mine.  There is a commonality in us all which will keep us connected until the last Rattler draws their last breath.
I know it still is MY town because if I go back I see the heart of home.  The people who buy your lunch without you knowing, the people who open their homes when it might be more peaceful for them not to do so, the people who wrap you up in bone crushing hugs and tell you how happy they are that you are home – and they mean it.  I know it in the words of our school song that we all remember and sing with a catch in our throats and tears in our eyes.
So, yes, I am a small town girl.  Born in a small town and raised in another one.  I’m glad that I come from the people I come from and I’m proud of the place that taught me to be the person I am.  I am grateful for all the people in my life who love me for ME and who find me a person worth knowing.  I am learning to lean on that knowledge and know my own truth.  I am enough, I am valued, I am worthy………..I am a Rattler….and I am proud.