"I've Got All I Need Right Here, In A Small Town"

When I think of a small town, I think of the weekly newspaper, where a woman sits alone in the darkness. She is finishing her story on last night’s school board meeting, which will appear on the front page next to the photo of some Boy Scouts who raised money for a homeless shelter. As she writes, she is careful to quote the school board members accurately, without elaboration. For forty years she has followed a fundamental journalistic credo — she is not the news, only a reporter of it. 

I also think of a pastor who picnics with his family and their small congregation on a warm Sunday afternoon. The morning’s message was entitled “Pass The Salt,” which encourages polite, grateful, complimentary, and humble behavior, the qualities that most reflect God’s heart. "We should model the joy in life, not beat people up with its shortcomings," he says. “It’s like corn on the cob. If I sprinkle a little bit of salt on it, it is tasty and makes me want more. But if I dump the whole salt shaker on it, I’m only left with one choice — to spit it out.”

And I think of the tavern that has a burger and a beer for three bucks, and a local band known as “The Silvertones.” It’s the place to be. They play sing-along classics like “American Pie” and “Hound Dog” and “Sweet Caroline,” but then every now and then they slow it down. One night three years ago, a guy mustered up the courage to approach a girl he had known since high school. They danced. They hit it off. Now they have a beautiful old house across town and their first child on the way. He now has a special request every Friday night, “My Girl.”

“Got nothing against the big town,” John Mellencamp says.

“But I can breathe in a small town, and that’s just where I wanna’ be.”

If you live in America’s heartland, you cannot spend your days on the beach, I realize.

But we can stroll down Main Street in a small town, which is a thing of beauty in a whole other way.

…

WHEN I THINK OF a small town, I think of a mom and her teenage daughter going to a drug store to buy

a eye shadow and lipstick, because the time has come for her to wear such things. But only in moderation. “Honey, I know what it like,” the mom says. “When you’re fourteen you want to be seventeen, and then when you’re seventeen you want to be twenty-one. Take it from me, the years will come soon enough, and it won’t be long that you’ll be wishing they don’t come quite so fast.”

I also think of a coach who stands at midfield after the last home football game. For thirteen years, he has emphasized character, hard work, and fundamentals, knowing that success is the byproduct of all those things. At this level, the players don’t play for scholarships — only the love of the game. As he takes one last look around, the coach smiles. After the game, he had been approached by two parents whose son was not a starter. “We can never thank you enough for how much you have loved our son,” they said. “He’s a better person for having been part of this team. The skills he will take with him will make him a better man.” For the coach, this was the highest compliment he could receive.

And I think of an elderly woman with a fresh bouquet of flowers, placing them on the grave of a man who was her husband for sixty-seven years. Actually, he is still her husband, and always will be. She misses him terribly, but celebrates every day that he is no longer in pain, and now lives the life no human can even imagine. She holds the note he wrote to her just before he died. “When we were teenagers, I waited for you to notice me. When you were in college, I waited for you to come back to marry me. But when I am gone, I will still be waiting for you to join me. Forever.”

I lived in Springboro when I was a kid, then graduated from Franklin — both small towns in the grand scheme of things.

I now serve Warren County, which is a collection of other great small towns like Morrow, Clarksville, South Lebanon, Carlisle, Pleasant Plain, Lebanon, Mason, and Waynesville (the latter of which is where I took this photo of my wife Kim last fall). 

I love our small towns. I am thankful to know so many wonderful people. I am blessed.
…

WHEN I THINK of a small town, I think of a retired school teacher who sits on his front porch on a cool summer night. He has spent the day cutting grass, walking his dog, and running errands around town — running into countless former students who love him dearly. As the night comes to an end, he listens to the symphony of the crickets, with his wife at his side. “You know, the kids keep saying we need to move to Florida,” she says. “They have new condos and big towns down there.”

He reaches over and grabs her hand. He smiles.

“And leave this?”

Nah…

"I've got all I need right here."