Everyday America….a little town with a great big life.

I’ve been walking this weird line on my blog lately. The true growth and business side of it is almost 100% A Gutsy Girl focused. Most people stumble upon my blog through a Google search for something gut related. Sometimes they gravitate towards the full story and blog because they want to join the entire journey; usually, though, this is a place purely for all things gut, gut health, and gut healing information. 

So even though I know my time (from a business growth and financial standpoint) would be best spent here producing all the gut content, I have to be perfectly honest: I just can’t.

If I died tomorrow, I would be happy knowing that I helped thousands of women on their gut healing journey, but I would be far more content knowing that I had written posts like these that my children would have for life.

Back Home

My cousin asked me at the soccer game the other night,

What do you miss most about California?

I wanted to give him a long and lengthy list because there were so many beautiful things about our time spent in California.

Instead, I just sort of blurted out,

Nothing.

I then stopped, backed up a second, and said, 

That’s not fully true. I do miss the mountains, and the access to all the food. But beyond that, really nothing.

I reflected later that night and realized just how true that was. I also remembered some of my key friendships there that I do, in fact, miss……namely, Jen, Vanessa, Hills, Tami, Rebecca, Stephanie, Jules, and of course, my soul-sistah – Elisabeth.

But I told my cousin about this awful feeling I had at Samarah’s birthday party last Saturday. I was enjoying time with family and friends and all the sudden thought that, come Monday, we had to fly back to California (a common practice for the past 11 years). An overwhelmingly sad feeling took over my body. It was easy to snap out of it because it’s not true, but in that moment I realized what an incredible (almost) 9 months it’s been back home.

Back home….

• Everyone wears the blue and gold proudly.
• I don’t go anywhere without running into someone I know.
• I get to watch Clare and Carmen (Carmen is my Godchild) play soccer and do all the things. They are now in 10th and 12th grade, so time is dwindling.
• When we bring the kids to high school games, there is always someone – usually teenagers – who scoop them up to play. Sometimes we don’t even know them. Like the other night at the soccer game. A group of girls fell in love with the kids and basically ran around with them all night long. It was so cool to watch!
• It’s easy to get anywhere at any given moment.
• We live for the smaller things in life.
• I can drive my dad’s truck whenever 🙂
• There is a real and true community.
• People don’t bail on a dime.
• Town events and festivals are a thing. Sure we had them in California but they were more, “Walk in, peruse and get out as quickly as possible because there were too many people; 99% of which you had never seen before.”
• It’s just a jump, skip, and hop away to see family and friends in the Minneapolis suburbs. (I can get to my cousin Kim’s in 60 minutes, almost to the minute, from door-to-door.)
• There are four true seasons, and I’m embracing the change from one to the next in ways I could never appreciate prior to the California move.

Sometimes when I’m driving with the kids through town, I’ll grab my phone, turn on Spotify and crank up Everyday America because it reminds me of this small town constantly. 

Everyday America

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Back in January during my 101-ish days of consecutive blogging, I shared one of my favorite songs, Love Your Baby Girl, and in the post I mentioned I’d share several favorite songs. The series ended before I got past the first. 

This is the second song, and even though it’s not a slow song, it gets me every single time. 

I now know a world out there filled with lovely mountains and beautiful Palm trees, and have experienced lovely weather unending with the highest-quality food around. 

I will remember it forever, and feel grateful for the years we experienced it.

But it will never compare to the everyday America, small town pride and joy we have here. To those who have never experienced it, it’s hard to describe. For those who have never left it, it’s also hard to describe how the grass is not always greener on the other side.

It’s just like Sugarland says,

A little town with a great big life.

p.s. I literally just realized that this is another Sugarland song, too.

Sugarland

Grew up on a tight rope
Learned to smile even when I was falling down
Daddy had a hard hand, and Mama always had hope
And me and my sister couldn’t wait to get out
Fell in love out of college
Good man for a bad year
Visions of sugarplums and boxes of roses
All my girlfriends cried, and I was outta here
Whoa, whoa, everybody’s dreaming big
Whoa, whoa, everybody’s just getting by
That’s how it goes in every day America
A little town with a great big life
Joey stares at a trophy
Took us all the way to state back in ’85
Shining moment and a dusty reminder
He felt so scared, never felt so alive
But now there’s toys in the backyard
Daddy’s boys; you know how they like to fight
When they sleep, he swears they’re angels
He wouldn’t trade a day for all those Friday nights
Whoa, whoa, everybody’s dreaming big
Whoa, whoa, everybody’s just getting by
That’s how it goes in every day America
A little town with a great big life
We can laugh
We can cry
We’re all just looking for the reasons why
In a place of dark can we see the light
Either way it’ll be alright
Whoa, whoa, everybody’s dreaming big
Whoa, whoa, everybody’s just getting by
That’s how it goes in every day America
A little town with a great big life
Whoa, whoa, everybody’s dreaming big
Whoa, whoa, everybody’s just getting by
That’s how it goes in every day America
A little town with a great big life
A little town with a great big life

Xox,
SKH