A home town is where you’re from. After a while, a home town is now where you’re from. Later on, the home town is where you’re from now. Finally, there is no finally, the home town is where you are.<\/p>\n
The trouble is, who agrees? People in the current hometown see you as a newcomer. To be an old-timer you have to be there X years plus oh maybe some extra Y years. Where the X and the Y are variable, depending on the stakes, of tenure.<\/p>\n
The earlier home towns don’t count, don’t count as home towns that is. But they’re important — good things and bad things happened in those places, that got you where you are now, God help you.<\/p>\n
The first home town, well, that still is your home town. Even the people still back there, who remember you, call it your home town. Not that they’d welcome you back for good, of course. You’ve changed, they haven’t.<\/p>\n
Someone not living in this home town told me last month, “You can’t make old friends.” She was right, friends if they last turn out that way.<\/p>\n
There’s no place like home. Damn it.<\/p>\n
Poem A home town is where you’re from. After a while, a home town is now where you’re from. Later on, the home town is where you’re from now. Finally, there is no finally, the home town is where you are. The trouble is, who agrees? People in the current hometown see you as a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6078","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-course-of-words"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":101,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2005\/11\/pinned-in-public\/","url_meta":{"origin":6078,"position":0},"title":"Pinned in public","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"November 12, 2005","format":false,"excerpt":"Copyright 2005 Ben S. Pollock Saturday, November 12, 2005. Two observations from a luncheon. OK, two and a half. This is long; sorry. It'd make a dandy underpinning of a story or play, and be clearer, but it's taken me a lot of years for one hour today to merge\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Body, Home, Street"","block_context":{"text":"Body, Home, Street","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/body-home-street\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":436,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2008\/06\/home-of-the-owls\/","url_meta":{"origin":6078,"position":1},"title":"Home of the Owls","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"June 22, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"NEW ORLEANS -- Come, see for yourself. My fellow conferees and myself, being journalists, have read about The Storm since it blew in Aug. 29, 2005, and refreshed ourselves before coming to town. Even though we're writers, some of us very good, none can explain the devastation and slow recovery\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "The Storm, New Orleans"","block_context":{"text":"The Storm, New Orleans","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/nsnc\/new-orleans-2008\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2195,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2010\/08\/mosque-ow-on-the-hudson\/","url_meta":{"origin":6078,"position":2},"title":"Mosque, Ow, on the Hudson","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"August 6, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"Some blasts from the vuvuzela. I used to play instruments, not just blow my own horn. While avoiding graven images, there's no writ against craven puns. Mosque, ow, on the Hudson? Saying where houses of worship do not belong raises all sorts of red flags, no matter the neighborhood, no\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Loose Talk of the Town"","block_context":{"text":"Loose Talk of the Town","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/briefs\/loose-talk-of-town\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":7,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2006\/02\/lose-friends-and-not-influence-people\/","url_meta":{"origin":6078,"position":3},"title":"Lose Friends and Not Influence People","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"February 10, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"Here's how. At least it works for me. When old friends e-mail you with the latest scare, tell them -- no, prove to them -- they're full of baloney. E-mail panics and their close cousins e-chain letters usually come from folks who live out of town. Why e-mail in town?\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Life Lessons"","block_context":{"text":"Life Lessons","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/life-lessons\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":3071,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2011\/08\/3-cheers-for-saturday\/","url_meta":{"origin":6078,"position":4},"title":"3 Cheers for Saturday","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"August 6, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"What, not four? Others are punditing U.S. economy very well. Why there'll always be real estate agents and contractors In the HomeStyle section of the Saturday regional\/state paper is the weekly Personal Space brief. Most weeks the subject, who is asked about her or his home and some biographical information,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Loose Talk of the Town"","block_context":{"text":"Loose Talk of the Town","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/briefs\/loose-talk-of-town\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":283,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2007\/02\/wheres-the-band-wheres-the-band\/","url_meta":{"origin":6078,"position":5},"title":"Where’s the Band? Where’s the Band?","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"February 20, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"*A line, near the end of The Music Man. I wasn't the only one Saturday afternoon on Fayetteville's Dickson Street to ask about the latest funereal Mardi Gras parade. 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