Fall in Love With Your Hometown
A How-To Guide for Creatives and Soul-Searchers
3 min readSep 6, 2021
- This is a solo adventure. For the creative soul, including others would mean enjoyment with their companions or compatriots. For soul-searchers, such an embarkment would require energy that they might not readily have. This adventure is an introspective journey — one that requires a slow pace and quiet meditation. For the introvert, it requires bravery. For the extrovert, it requires humility.
- Your hometown doesn’t have to be the town that you were raised in or nearby. Instead, it might be the town that you had spent most of your time in as a kid, or the town that brought you the most nostalgia of old times past. Perhaps it’s just that little town down the road that you never bothered to explore but have heard good things about. When you’ve marked it on your map as yours, you can claim it as yours.
- Even though this journey is short, you will want to plan for it. Allocate enough time for your trip. Remember, as adventures go they rarely follow any soul’s timeline. This timing should also include travel time, which should be approached at an ambling rather than rushed pace. In your pack of choice, rather than camping provisions you will want a small notebook and pen. You might also want to bring along a thermos of coffee or tea, depending on your preference.
- Park to the side in a parking lot or along a street. Let yourself wander the sidewalks. Brush your fingers against the brick sides of old buildings as you walk by. Look for advertisements for local events. Smell the lilies and other blooms filling the planters along the sidewalk. In essence, be present.
- You will eventually need a cup of coffee or tea, especially if you start this adventure in the morning. There are two ways in which to go about solving this: you can walk into a coffee shop or bring a thermos of your preferred beverage to enjoy. Regardless, your job is to take in the scenery, and in turn become part of it.
- If there is one, stop in at the local art gallery or small shops. It doesn’t matter if you know nothing about art. Wander around and look at what other creatives are doing. If a piece inspires joy, consider purchasing it and bringing it home.
- Step into the small stores and take in the aromas and sights. You might find the best ones are the ones most cluttered with odds and ends. Chat with the store owners, learn about what they make or sell and why they do what they do. Listen especially to those who have lived other lives — they are the ones who wish the best for you, for the community, for those they’ve met and those they’ve yet to meet.
- Drive home with the radio off. Give yourself space to think and ponder and breathe.
- Write or photograph or paint or craft what you want to remember. This journey, like this town you’ve claimed, is yours. What you make doesn’t have to be shared, it has to be remembered. What is a memory if not a marker of growth? or insight? or experience?