In an attempt to be profound in this entry, I must also show you my self-centered side. I know you'll indulge me, just this once.
But first, a little rambling...
One of these days, those of you who are younger than I am by ten or twenty years will be in the same place I am right now -- that vague void between young age and old age that is sometimes known as limbo (this vague void is more pronounced if you are still single). Old people will see you as young (but not for much longer), and young people will see you as old (forevermore). As for most people your own age, they will be busy with their own families and/or careers.
When you arrive here -- in this vague void -- you will finally understand just how wrong it feels to use the phrase, "It was thirty years ago today...," when referring to a day that you can remember as if it were only yesterday. For instance, ten years ago, when I was 35, I could have said, "It was thirty years ago today...," and I would not have caused myself too much mental stress. Why? Because my memories of my life at the age of five are really vague. It was still the beginning of my life. Today, at the age of 45, when I say, "It was thirty years ago today...," I am referring to myself at the age of 15. My life at that age doesn't feel like another lifetime. The memories are still really clear. In fact, it feels as if it were only yesterday in some ways. I was pretty much the same person then as I am now (only with a lot less experience and a lot more optimism because of it).
But there is more: What if time also seemed to stop for me "thirty years ago today"? Of course, I don't mean that in the literal sense. Rather it stopped in more of a metaphysical, science-fictiony sort of way, wherein the protagonist says, "Hold on a minute; I'll be right back." Then he steps through a door and into a waiting room in the Twilight Zone, never to be heard from again.
I am like that protagonist. Even now I am able to look back through that door and see that day in 1976, exactly as it was, waiting for me to return.
But, of course, I cannot return. I can only view it in sad resignation (even if I could return, what sort of bag of mixed blessings would await me?).
The main point of this rambling, pseudo-philosophical prelude is the fact that when I utter the phrase, "It was thirty years ago today...," it feels really wrong, or rather unreal. I was only supposed to be gone a minute...
Okay I suppose I'll Get to the Anti-Climactic Point.
It was thirty years ago today (Wednesday, July 21, 1976), that my family moved from our home in central South Dakota to a home here in western Nebraska. I desperately did not want to move here. We had visited this town six weeks earlier, and I did not like what I had seen. Please don't jump to conclusions, though. I didn't even know that my parents were considering moving here when we made that visit, so one cannot say that I was judging it through biased eyes. I just didn't like the general unfriendliness of the residents of this area. They seemed to exude a strong air of conceit and snobbishness, even when they were trying to be friendly.
As for a sense of humor in the local population, it was totally non-existent (and nothing has changed). That didn't bode well for a kid who had grown up in a place where good-natured sarcastic humor was everything to everyone.
As for my own generation, the kids in this area were especially rude, conceited and humorless. They were even foul mouthed right in front of adults. That was a new experience for my family, and it should have given my dad (a former teacher) pause in his plans to move here, but it didn't. His mind was already made up.
As I reread the previous three paragraphs, I can sense that everyone who reads it must surely think I am exaggerating. Regrettably, I am not.
During the last day of that short "reconnaissance" visit, while my parents were out with the "boss" and his wife, I accidentally learned that we would be moving here. I can remember the blood going to my feet and my indignation rising in my brain when I looked on the "boss's" refrigerator and saw "house hunting with the 'MW' family" scrawled on a note. That gave me six weeks in which to try to convince my dad to change his mind, while also anticipating with terrible dread "the end" of "paradise" as I knew it.
As you already know, I was unsuccessful in changing his mind, but I never stopped trying, even after we had moved here (I did it more for the sake of revenge after we had moved here, because I hated that I had been treated as if my life and goals were meaningless).
Worst of all, there had been no sense in my dad's decision to move here. He was doing extremely well at his "district manager's" job in South Dakota, consistently beating most other district managers in the region (that's why the "boss" liked him so much). The move to this town (the "boss's" home town) was purely optional and completely superfluous.
Of course, the unfriendliness of the people in this town wasn't my only reason for not wanting to move here. I desperately did not want to leave my old home and my best friends either, all of whom looked positively saintly and exciting compared to the kids here. It had taken me a long time to start liking it in that little town in South Dakota and to make real friends there. In fact, I had even started to love living in that little town, in spite of its own numerous flaws.
How It Turned Out in Nebraska
When we arrived here thirty years ago today (egad, it's hard to write that!), there was still one month of summer vacation remaining. It gave me time to acclimate myself to my new environment before dealing with a new school and new classmates. We lived a few hundred yards outside the city limits, so my brother and I were isolated from most of the rest of the town and its inhabitants. By early August, I had started to imagine that I might not hate it here as much as I originally thought I would. I was even considering the possibility that I might make even better friends here than I had in South Dakota. It's not that I was thinking maturely. I was simply a natural-born optimist in those days (as I state in the fourth paragraph). The hopeful kid in me couldn't help but fantasize that there were great friends and beautiful girls just waiting to be met once school started.
When school finally did start, I was still optimistic -- and nervous. Within two days, my optimism was out the window. I realized I had accurately described the kids here two and a half months earlier. In fact, I had been too kind in my description of them (there were very few attractive girls either).
Making matters worse (ironically), I was a friendly, naive and optimistic sort. The kids here were cold and unfriendly. They took delight in laughing in the faces of new kids who were friendly, naive and optimistic. It took me a long, long time to learn to give up trying to become friends with any of them (there were a couple of very minor exceptions). When I finally did give up, I was a lot more cynical than I had ever been before. A lot of the kids in my hometown in South Dakota may have been obnoxious troublemakers a lot of the time, but when it came right down to it, most of them, deep down, were good-natured, friendly characters who would go out of their way to make a person feel welcome.
Naturally, my parents refused to believe me when I told them about my experiences with the local kids (at least that's what my dad told me at the time). They were convinced that I was either making it up (they knew I had not wanted to move here) or that it was my fault that I couldn't make any friends. As a result, I grew to resent them more and more with every passing day for ever bringing me to this place against my will and then not believing me when I tried to tell them what it was like for me here (long story as to why I am here again at this time). This was somewhat ironic in my dad's case, because his parents had moved him from his beloved hometown in South Dakota when he was a freshman, and he had spent the next two years doing everything he could to get them to move back, to no avail. You would think he would have realized that he had become his dad and was putting me through the same situation that he had experienced.
Conclusion
I spent two long, miserable years here as a sophomore and junior. Near the end of my junior year, I was lucky enough to spend a week with friends in my old home in South Dakota (my parents let me make the trip alone). I even went to school every day as a guest. It was a truly wonderful experience. Kids who had hardly noticed me before were genuinely happy to see me again. I was treated like an honored guest. After two years of nothing but rudeness, insults and indifference, I felt as if I was in heaven.
Long story short (I'll tell it at length some other time), in August 1978, I was actually able to return to my old home in South Dakota -- alone -- and attend my entire senior year of school there. My parents were actually enlightened enough to trust me (my dad may have had enough of my continual complaining, too ;-). Besides, I stayed with some of their old acquaintances anyway, so they felt it was safe. Aside from the family with whom I stayed, it was a dream come true.
Endnote
Not long after moving here, it had become clear that my dad's "boss" had greatly exaggerated the "potential" of this area with regard to product sales. By then, my dad was too proud to admit his mistake, especially to me, because he would have been admitting that I, a mere kid, had been right about this place all along. Years later, when I was in college, and he was living in South Dakota, Montana or Wyoming, he admitted that I had been right about the people of this town all along. He had hated it here as much as I did. I refrained from screaming this question at him: "Then why did we stay?! And why did you let me think I was losing my mind all those years?!" His reply: "Because you were a pain in the ass back then. I wasn't about to let you know that you were right."]
