Growing up in Ohio, I often dreamt of leaving. Going to plays on Broadway, out to bars in Boston, hanging out at Piccadilly Circus in London or talking philosophy over coffee in Seattle; all of these naïve images were what I imagined leaving small town Ohio and going to real cities would be like. I imagined going from having nothing to do to having too much to do, too much culture, too much style, too much to talk about and too many places to go.
Well, two-and-a-half odd years later, I’ve traveled to places I never thought I would, been to most of the great metropolises in the United States and Europe, and seen first-hand what I naively dreamt of in high school. Is it all what I thought it was? Sure. But the question I really found myself asking was “Is Ohio really all I thought it was?”
After sipping wine in cafes on the boulevards of Paris, going out for late nights in Prague, getting lost in Chicago and being yelled at in Manhattan, I appreciate Ohio more than ever before. I’m not sure what it is about this state and the Midwest that particularly appeals to me, but there is a certain attitude and character about it that you can’t find anywhere else in the world.
The Midwest is down. It’s riddled with literal “down towns,” abandoned strip malls, empty factories, and desolate cities. Despite all of this, people here continue to make the best of a bad situation. People are happy and are content with that happiness, even if all signs say they shouldn’t be; they should be mad and should demand better but they don’t. In other more illustrious and supposedly more successful areas, people aren’t happy, they aren’t content and they want more.
If New York is a new Cadillac and Ohio is an old Chevy Woody Wagon that is falling apart at the seams, I’d take the Chevy. The Chevy dropped me off at tee ball practice, had the windows down for the drive to the cottage, and still keeps on driving, despite all the leaks and rusty bolts. The Chevy’s not the best car on the road, but it’s our car and we’re going to keep driving it, washing it, and changing the oil because it’s ours and we’re damn proud of it.
