Shootin' it Straight - The County

 If you don’t truly appreciate all that is Jackson County, you haven’t traveled enough. I don’t say that with a condescending, snot-nosed attitude, as if I’m some well-heeled world traveler hopping from destination to destination for leisure. I assure you, I am not.

I do travel, sometimes by choice, often not, and almost always at a hefty penalty to my time at home. When you travel on vacations or carefully hand-picked leisure trips, you’re often blinded to the real nature of a place. Bright lights, tourist attractions, and Google searches for the “top five BBQ joints” do a fine job of masking what a location really is. You see what you’re meant to see, not what life there actually looks like when the brochures are put away.

I’ve spent real time in more “destination” places than I can remember, enough that I need old paper notes to keep track of them all. And I can tell you this with certainty: we have it good here.

We have relatively low crime. Peaceful neighborhoods. Rolling farms and wide open spaces that don’t feel crowded or rushed. We have beautiful places that don’t need a ticket booth or an Instagram filter. We know our people, not by name tags, but by the sound of their truck pulling into the drive. We have local diners, familiar faces, and the kind of conversations that don’t require a reservation or a time limit.

We have small-town values and real freedom, the kind you don’t notice until it’s gone. The list could be lengthy and elaborate, but if travel ever allows, you’ll eventually grasp it on your own.

Warm days are ahead. Drop the windows on your old pickup and take a drive. Stretch your arm out the window until the tall grass slaps your fingertips. Drive past a field turning green as the wind rolls through the open cab. Stop and chat with that old man who’s always got a story and nowhere pressing to be.

Find a creek and toss a few stones in, just to hear the splash. Get your truck dirty. Pull out of your drive and bark the tires. Fill a pop can full of holes out back. Grab a greasy pizza and enjoy it without apology.

I haven’t seen nearly all the world has to offer, but I’ve seen enough to know this, we have it pretty good.

Our rural corner of the world is getting the rest of it fed to us through a slow drip coffee filter. We come along at a trickle, and that’s an invaluable asset. It gives us time to breathe, to think, to hold on to what matters.

So soak it up. Appreciate it. Guard our way of life feverishly, because once it’s gone, no amount of travel will ever replace it.