Drawn ceaselessly into the past...

I'm from a little tiny town somewhere in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and I'm planning on heading back there this weekend to see some friends, drink a few beers, and hit the overstock stores that dot the landscape.

The place hasn't been the same since the Pennsylvania Rail Road collapsed and the steel industry died. I remember my mother taking me to the old train station to see what bits and pieces they were auctioning off before they tore it down. For years, rusting railcars sat on the tracks in the railyard, where another rail company operated a repair shop until a few years ago. Those cars are all gone now, and there's a huge expanse of empty space between one side of town and another, like a dried out river bed.

Houses there cost next to nothing, comparatively speaking. You could buy a new construction McMansion in one of the new developments for around $250K, or you could get a solid historic building in the center of town for far less. Of course, then you have to figure out what to do with yourself, workwise. There are a lot of retail jobs, so you could fold jeans at the Gap or corral carts at the Wal-Mart.

Still, I love the pastures and the stubby hills and the fact that 15 minutes driving from point to point is considered a long time to be in the car. Also that $1.10 will buy you a draft uptown. I am a cheap cheap bastard. There's a good deal of history there, something I spent a lot of time studying in my young adulthood as I bellied up to bars that had been there since the 19th century.

There are no Starbuck's, no Cosi, no Potbelly's. There's also no 9:30 Club or Black Cat. Mainly, there are friends, family, and memories, and in those three things there's a measure of security.