What it was like growing up in Hereford, Maryland

As a small town girl going to a university where the student population is 1.5 times the number of residents in my hometown, it is easy to feel like a small fish in a big pond.

When big-city friends would ask what Hereford, Maryland was like, my responses of empty freeways and beautiful pastures as wide as oceans were met with half-hearted smiles and apologetic looks.

Yet, what they do not understand is that growing up in small town USA gave me a unique experience that is different than the hustle and bustle of modern day norms that I did not fully appreciate until I left home.

Getting stuck behind a tractor is one of the most frustrating things

York Road is equal parts hometown comfort and hand-banging-on-the steering-wheel frustration. If I’m late, there is a solid chance I’m getting stuck behind a tractor on my way to work. I don’t remember a time in my life when this wasn’t a possibility.

There is only one stop light in Hereford, so the tractors must be a way to remind us that there are still forces at work beyond our control. Yeah, sure, it’s frustrating and sometimes they don’t pull over to let you pass, and you’re stuck for forty-five minutes behind this combine, but it’s an acceptable excuse for being late.

What happens when I don’t live in the country and I’m still late? What excuse will I use then? I might actually have to admit to oversleeping, or worse: I might have no excuse but to be on time for work.

Everyone knows everyone

Or at least someone knows someone who knows you.

In Hereford it isn’t six degrees of separation, it’s more like two (three if you’re really, really lucky) and that degree continues to shrink the longer your family has been around this “neck of the woods.”

Every country song you’ve ever heard is right: my porch light is always on, the door is rarely locked, and there really is a man who owns a produce stand with nothing more than a wooden lock box where customers slip their paper bills through the slot as payment.

When I drive by Hillbilly Beach– a clearing near the Gunpowder River where locals dip their summer feet into freezing cold water– I see at least three former classmates.

It’s familiar faces in familiar places, no matter how long I’ve been gone.

Sometimes cows are better than people

One summer I named all the cows in my back yard based on their personality. The bull was named Jimi (short for Jimi Hendrix) and there was a friendly Heifer I lovingly named Jessica Simpson. My love of animals grew from the inescapable presence of them throughout my childhood.

My high school mascot was a bull, I spent an entire spring convincing my family to buy six chicks (an argument I won), and I once let a horse stand on my foot just because I didn’t want to disturb her while she was eating. Home for me is sometimes more four legged than it is two legged, and there is a peace with that that even I can’t really understand.

Looking up at the night sky gives you a new perspective on the world

When I moved away to college I had no idea that stargazing was such a luxury. In the shelter of my hometown with the crickets, and the cicadas, and the 4th of July Parade that rolled through the middle of town every year, it rarely (if ever) occurred to me that not everyone got to look up and see the Milky Way every night. It’s hard for me to imagine a future where lightning bugs aren’t the opening act for a full moon that sits low just above the tops of the cornstalks.

The importance of hometowns is indescribable—always unfolding and revealing themselves to us when we least except it.  I’ve taken the same two lane road home for as long as I can remember, and still there are things I learn about this place every time I round the last bend right below Bunker Hill. They become the roots of us, anchoring us down deep so that we can grow into all the places we dream of going.

As I look to return to university for my last fall semester, I cannot help but be both excited and hesitant to what my future holds.  Though my future plans are far from concrete, whatever I choose will pull me further away from my familiar exit 36 and the gravel driveways that led to the first place I will always call home.