Life Is Awesome

I forgot to post about checking something off my life list: revisiting Franklin, TN & my childhood memories.

I think I forgot to post about it because it’s occurrence was accidental. Kepa and I went to visit friends in the Nashville area and the convenient meeting spot for dinner happened to be Franklin, so I got a chance to revisit all the places I knew as a child.

I grew up in Franklin, TN, and was 11 when we moved away. I had so many good memories of places there that I always held it in my mind as a utopia of sorts. And even though I’ve lived in Tennessee for over a decade since then I’d never made the trip back to my old spots. I’d even been to Franklin several times yet never made it across town to the area where I lived as a child.

It’s funny how you collect certain memories from your childhood and hang on to them. If you move on from a place your memories (and photos) are generally all that you have left.  After visiting Franklin and seeing all the places I used to play I realized my memories are quite deciving. That hill we used to ride our bikes down? It’s not nearly as steep as I remember. The walk from school to our apartment? It’s nowhere near as long as I thought it was. Memories are amazing, but memories from childhood are often distorted.

And then there is the fact that things change. That empty field we used so often it had dirt lines where we “ran the bases” of our baseball field? It’s full of green grass and trees now.

The school where I first learned my love for reading and writing and all things educational? Well, they still had the playground equipment I remember, even if there were a few new additions.

The strangest part about being back in a place you only knew as a child is that you feel like a child again as soon as you set foot there. Swinging on the swings, walking around the track, climbing on the playground stuff – I felt like I was a little kid again. All the memories rush back instead of just the selected few that always get replayed. Going back to your childhood places makes you feel like a child again. At least it did for me. I’m so glad I had this on my life list and crossed it off!

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