“County Line Life”
For anyone who’s dreamed of a world beyond the confines of your county lines, or for anyone who’s missed it after they left,
this one’s for you.
Sometimes, stories pour from raw, fanciful parts of my soul - explorations of people, places, or feelings I’ve not known. Occasionally, it’s only a feeling I have to pull from, thus emerging various imaginings from a single reality. Such vivid colors and scenes enter my mind, I can’t help but get them out on paper.
Sometimes, though, my real life experiences so profoundly inspire or change me that they seep into my writing. This was one such time. In a few pages, I captured a lesson that took me years and much distance to learn, without even meaning to.
Now, I give it to you.
County Line Life
by Bethany E. Kolb
The Poet used to write about grand adventures -
Places unknown to me, sequestered in my corner of lifetime-knowing.
My county road goes ever on, winding always back to home.
How I admired the Poet’s gall!
To follow dirt roads to their pavement,
To portal between worlds,
And dare to record his treasured findings
In written tapestry so finely woven for me.
“It’s like I was there,” I wrote to him one day.
“Scouring the earth for better buildings,
Wilder creatures, windier storms.
They will never be enough for me.”
The Poet never replied, but I bought his every column
As though his words alone the portal outpoured.
Over the years, his poems changed -
Less adventure, more repetition
Of the same-old concepts I have here.
“Daisies in sidewalks, hens in coops,
Harder days, and fresher food.”
But I didn’t want to live here any longer.
Why read about it too?
My heart longed for life beyond county lines,
For worlds I hadn’t seen, for me’s I hadn’t been.
As did his, my writings changed,
Full of riled scorn for the puritan-spirit reborn;
“What doused your mighty sense of adventure?
Share that secret, so I might avoid it,
More alert than these who stay behind.
I’ll never succumb to their county-line lives.”
This time, the elder Poet wrote back to me.
With eager heart turned crushed fancies,
I read his letter, full of helpless nuances,
And tossed it in a bottom drawer,
Deeming it and his column forgotten e’ermore.
The years brought new poets, new fads,
New artists, new courting lads.
I entertained all things curious and young
And stayed for all but none,
For the portal to other worlds called me.
I crossed the county line fearless and free.
By my youth, it was lovely!
The Poets’ woven gold undershone its beauty
A wandering life at last was mine
With all its beauties, intricate and divine!
Over years worthy of musical tears,
The lyrics fell at last on listening ears
And set the strangest phenomenon to motion.
Amid rose gardens, I missed the pure white of daisies.
Though I loved chocolate pastries, I craved garden herbs.
I’d grown accustomed to train whistles and bells,
But I missed the rooster’s crow and hens’ “farewells.”
My heart grew wider with every new world -
A gateway to pieces of me unearthed -
But, perhaps, I’d not carried all of it with me
From the first place, after all, it seems.
Perhaps my intention wasn’t so easy to pack
And throw on my back, all sentiment be damned.
So, between my venture to Italy and Rome,
I took a week to travel home,
Bringing along my truest love I’d ever known.
The county air smelled sweeter after time away,
The lines not so constricting in autumn days.
How had I never noticed the orange evening rays?
Perhaps, I was growing soft like those before
Who’d portaled in youth to other worlds;
Perhaps, it took some travel to my home again adore.
My mother left my room untouched,
A shrine to the girl who couldn’t wait to get away,
Now a hearth for the traveler who couldn’t wait to stay.
And so I did, over winter - we spent holiday with my family,
Gathering eggs from the old coop,
Planting vegetables for spring bloom,
And imagining a simpler life for our children.
In searching for garden gloves, I found the Poet’s letter.
Faded envelope untouched around words
I should have memorized long ago.
“I’m finally ready to read again,” I whispered,
As though he from heaven could hear me.
To my warm surprise, his words remind
Me to this day of my own traveling time
And all I learned for myself.
For wisdom is too often lost on young ears,
And perhaps that youth is entitled to their learning,
For only in its wake will they be for wisdom yearning.
Such is what the Poet wrote to me:
“You, sweet dear, mirror a younger me.
How close to my ambition is yours resembling.
Yes, I wrote of mighty treks
And regret not one, though I carry regrets.
I embraced my youth with open arms
And shunned those less willing to their own mindsets disarm.
Much of your words bask in truth; some are confined
To those world-wide county lines.
A shame, indeed, to never venture
To portals, to only embrace familiar tenure.
Yet, be not so quick to kick the dust in your wake.
Careful not to slam the door on your way,
For you may find yourself longing to return one day.”
There is where I’d stopped reading
In the foolish knowledge of my know-nothing youth.
Now, I flipped the page and began to cry
In the hearth of my full, full-circle life.
“Many are the roads around the world,
And they all await you with their secrets and pearls.
Don’t dance in the folly of never wondering,
For the pursuit of curiosity makes stories worthy of telling..
But neglect not when your feet grow tired,
And when of newness you soon grow weary.
I certainly did, and only then did I discover:
It is no shame to long for simplicities.
So, embrace youth with open arms
And home-loving adulthood with compassionate heart.
Take every adventure, young one,
As long as the road always leads you home.”
So, our character finally gets her wish. She leaves her rural home, embarks on grand adventures, and even falls in love. Somewhere in the living, though, she grew up. Craving home became natural again, and even visiting had a new air to it, looking through the eyes of a wife and grown woman. Perhaps the wisdom of elders isn’t so easily dismissed after all; we, simply, must grow up ourselves to fully appreciate it.
It’s okay if you must leave your county lines for a bit (or for a while). Chase dreams, travel, see the world. Find out who you are in your entirety.
Just never fully disregard the sanctuary of home. Be it the one you built or the one you’ve always known, don’t deny what the songs and poets have tried to tell us all along.
“Country roads, take me home…”
“If more of us valued food and cheer and song over hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world.”