Going back home

I'm planning on a trip to Virginia where I was born, but not raised. Sadly,most of my Uncles have passed,but I still have one Uncle in the old home town and another Uncle just 2 hours away in Danville,VA and a slew of cousins.

I lived in this town in my 18 to 20 years of age and worked and lived there. It's not like I'm a complete stranger to the town or my kin.

I haven't visited the town in four years. That was when my Mother's only sister passed away, just a little longer after the year my Mother died.

I call my two surviving Uncles every month but my cousins seem to think I'm way out west here in Indiana and never ever call me.

OK.I'm feeling a little sad and morose now, but I sure miss those Blue Ridge Mountains and family.

Does any one else feel like an "outsider" when visiting their old home place?

My 45th high school reunion is this August and I don't think I'll attend. I'll have to travel all the way up to Plymouth,IN , a five plus hour drive, and I honestly don't really care. I keep in touch with a few select friends via e-mail or facebook and really don't give a hoot about the travel and expenses to see a bunch of 63 year old farts like me tottering around a banquet hall reliving old high school days.

[QUOTE=Tyme2fish;493203]I'm planning on a trip to Virginia where I was born, but not raised. Sadly,most of my Uncles have passed,but I still have one Uncle in the old home town and another Uncle just 2 hours away in Danville,VA and a slew of cousins.

I lived in this town in my 18 to 20 years of age and worked and lived there. It's not like I'm a complete stranger to the town or my kin.

I haven't visited the town in four years. That was when my Mother's only sister passed away, just a little longer after the year my Mother died.

I call my two surviving Uncles every month but my cousins seem to think I'm way out west here in Indiana and never ever call me.

OK.I'm feeling a little sad and morose now, but I sure miss those Blue Ridge Mountains and family.

Does any one else feel like an "outsider" when visiting their old home place?

My 45th high school reunion is this August and I don't think I'll attend. I'll have to travel all the way up to Plymouth,IN , a five plus hour drive, and I honestly don't really care. I keep in touch with a few select friends via e-mail or facebook and really don't give a hoot about the travel and expenses to see a bunch of 63 year old farts like me tottering around a banquet hall reliving old high school days.[/QUOTE]

In my own way I understand what your saying. I am a Military Brat and moved alot during my childhood but I lived in Central Florida for over 20 years and when I return it's just not the same. Of course the places I played and caused trouble in has changed alot. Super Walmarts, Lowes and other major chain store have Been built over the swamps and fields we played and partied in. Friends have passed on and or moved and same with family. It's fun to find an old dirt road that we used to hang and drive like bandits on...kinda cool to relive the good old days.

I grew up in the north east. I have lived in Kentucky now for about twenty-one years. I never really thought about the likelihood that I might spend the rest of my life here. However I met my wife got married and had a family, and even though Kentucky probably will never feel like "home" to me, this is their home and it is a good place to raise a family.

However when I now go back "home" it is also gone. My parents have long since retired sold the house I grew up in and moved away from there. My sister is married and lives in another part of the country. My closest friends moved away, and others I lost touch with. The area has now changed so much in the past twenty years that when visiting everything that is not new and different seems older and smaller then it used to be. It makes you realize just how much life keeps moving on.

So I understand just how you feel. Somehow without really seeing it coming all the connections with my youth just simply vanished. I wish there was a point I would have realised it was happening just before it was gone to appreciate it more. That one last final visit while there was still enough of the past present to still feel like it was home.

Tyme I feel a lot like you do and am almost completely alone since my mother and both brothers died suddenly about 4-1/2 years ago. All my grandparents, aunts and uncles are deceased and I don't know if I have any distant relatives.

I no longer go to my high school and college class reunions. I discovered that time stops for no one; the high school beauty queen who was stuck-up and acted like a diva had become old, fat, ugly, gray, and wrinkled with a big butt. The school football captain was bald, wore dentures, and drank too much....and to think that I once drooled over him. I'm sure the wrinkles at the corners of my mouth and the crow's feet around my eyes must be from smiling too much. Sometimes my hair changes color on its own; I have changed it so many times I don't know what color it's supposed to be and I think the white roots around the front may be an indication that I'm going blonde. lol

I am very happy with my life and what I have become and have nothing to prove to anyone. I'm not interested in answering questions about my career, my success (and failures), or my husband. That seems to be the basis for class reunions in my neck of the woods and I don't attend.

Wish I could help I live in the town I was born and raised. Just go and have fun.