I is for Indiana

***I’m going to try to post something every day in the month of November. I definitely may not- it’s just a goal and I’m not going to be upset about missing it! Hopefully in my spare time, I can come up with a post per day. My prompts are going to be the letters of the alphabet. I will write about something that starts with the day’s letter- think Sesame Street meets the blogsphere. Of course there are more days in the month of November than there are letters in the alphabet. I’ll cross that bridge if I come to it!***

I don't remember exactly the first time that I heard the Joe Diffie country song titled, Home. But I do know that I was no longer living in Indiana when I first realized the lyrics of the song and how they resonated with me. I know that I was living in Ohio, in law school, and would never again live in the house that I grew up in and would likely never live in the state of Indiana again. I had left home.

And when one chapter ends and a new one begins, it's easy for the sentimentally natured person to reflect on what once was. At least Joe and I have that tendency...😉

Here the lyrics to the song Home

The only thing I see ahead
Is just the heat rising off the road
The rainbows I've been chasing
Keep on fading 'fore I find my pot of gold

And more and more I'm thinking
That the only treasures that I'll ever know
Are long ago and far behind
Wrapped up in my memories of home

Home was a swimming hole
And a fishing pole
And the feel of a muddy road
Between my toes
Home was a back porch swing
Where I would sit
And mama'd sing 'Amazing Grace'
While she hung out the clothes
Home was an easy chair
With my daddy there
And the smell of Sunday supper on the stove
My footsteps carry me away
But in my mind I'm always going home

Now the miles I put behind me
Ain't as hard as the miles that lay ahead
And it's way too late to listen
To the words of wisdom that my daddy said

The straight and narrow path he showed me
Turned into a thousand winding roads
My footsteps carry me away
But in my mind I'm always going home

Home was in the middle of nowhere Indiana in a run down farmhouse with a linoleum floor in the kitchen, inadequate heat for those harsh northern Indiana winters and no air conditioning for those hot and humid summer days, the sound of mice clamoring around in walls, ONE bathroom for a family of six or seven depending on whether you're counting before or after the death of my dad when all five us kids were still living at home, no garage to speak of after a brush fire too near the detached garage burnt down the garage and the station wagon that was within it, an assortment of old vehicles parked helter skelter on either side of the long gravel driveway and a garden so big we youngins' knew that all too much time was going to be expected of us therein to help out during the spring and summer.

And yet home was also reading the Bible and singing hymns together, making popcorn on the stove complete with butter and salt and washed down a 7Up  every Monday evening while watching Little House on the Prairie on the black and white TV, playing in the creek on our property and going on walks in our woods, jumping in the hayloft in the barn and discovering small rooms in the barn that became our clubhouse, coming home from school knowing there was the possibility though not the probability that we were going to be greeted with the scent of chocolate chip cookies baking in the oven, giggling together under homemade forts, making "newscasts" that we presented to any adult who may be around, not believing in Santa Claus but knowing that our parents saved up money each year to buy presents for us at Christmas, and being tucked in each night being assured we were loved not just by our parents but by the Creator of the universe. So not so bad after all ;)

Let's talk about Indiana for a little bit- what is not to like about it? Cornfields, conservatism, a bunch of small towns and in the center of it all, the Big City of Indianapolis. I love being from Indiana!

And yet, I love Ohio as well. And I love where we currently live. I love living less than two miles from the high school and less than a mile from the school where I sub the most. I love going on walks with Donnie and running into a couple whose older two kids are our older two kids' ages and who've known each other since preschool and stopping to talk with the couple for forty minutes before we all moved on with our walks. I love living within walking distance of our town's small downtown and have fond memories of walking to the ice cream store with the kids when they were younger. I love living within walking distance of two non- chain coffee shops and walking to these shops numerous times not because I love coffee because I don't but because Abby does and on the way to and from walking to the shops we've solved the world's problems and walked in companionable silence. I love so much about the area that we live and the life that Donnie and I have built here.

But in my mind, I'm always going home

This is a little church about a mile from the house where I grew up. My parents and brother are buried in the cemetery behind the church.

This is a picture of the road that leads to my house from the church. The church (the one in the picture above) is to the right of the tree in this picture.

Part of our lane

I found this old picture that I took many years ago- I think I took it to capture the rainbow. I like that it shows the barn in the distance, the clothes line and that small building is the chicken coop.

The outhouse pictured here was not the one bathroom that I referenced before. Our home was built well before indoor plumbing was a thing, ergo the outhouse, but someone added plumbing including a bathroom at some point. Note the nearby cornfield, one of the outbuildings (we had numerous random buildings on the property!) and the too small little pool for us kids.

Just like Joe Diffie crooned, here is the swing on the back porch...

What's an old farmstead without various farm implements? We had several tractors/ old pieces of equipment. Here I am with my dad.

Our barn

I think this is one of the prettiest views of our house- these French doors that separated the living from what we called the dining room (we didn't dine in the room and it contained a couch and was where our TV was located but still my mom called it the dining room?)

Home