I Could Tell You...

It amazes me how people can so easily and happily sum up their childhoods, their neighborhoods, their families, and where they come from.

They know exactly what and who it is that has made them who they are.

I have trouble defining things so precisely - especially in just a single blog post.

Where/What I come from?

It's a complicated answer.



I could tell you all about the South-Suburbs of Chicago and how growing up you knew which shopping malls to go to and which to avoid, where to get the best hot dogs, and what train you took to get downtown.

I could tell you about the small Lutheran church and school that was like my second home.

I could tell you about how my dad was a funeral director and my sister and I grew up living above the funeral home. We hosted sleepovers downstairs and walking through the preparation room was a daily occurrence.

I could tell you more about how I break and spent large chunks of my childhood in hospitals and made friends with doctors, nurses, and physical therapists.

I could tell you about my high school and how I was in marching band, choir, madrigals, theatre, and meeting so many people who were different than me.

I could tell you about my immediate family and our dog Josie. What my dad did, what my mom did, how we spent holidays, my relationship with my sister, and when we picked out our dog.

I could tell you about my mom's side of the family in Indiana and our frequent road trips to visit. Putting up Grandma's 9 foot Christmas tree every year the day after Thanksgiving, going to the single screen movie theatre, Grandpa buying us candy from Handy Andy's, big dinners with aunts, uncles, and cousins,  and playing on the stairs with my cousins at our grandparents old Victorian house.

I could tell you about my first experiences in theatre and music and writing and reading.

I could tell you about my childhood friends from school and my neighborhood filled with Halloween parties and long afternoons in the swimming pool on lazy summer days.

I could tell you about going to college and how much I loved my friends, classes, and professors.

I could tell you about moving to Missouri and my first "real adult" job.

But even then... I know I would be leaving something out. Our lives are like collages. Filled from edge to edge with snapshots, quotes, people, faces, places, and things. There are even pieces that we may not know about right that which make up who we are and where or what we came from. Taking even just one part would make the collage incomplete.

So where/what do I come from?

A lot of things and places and people. They're all equally important.