It has probably been true of every generation, but I have come to the realization that the world in which I grew up no longer exists. When I was much younger and left Montana for graduate school in Chicago, I lived with a fantasy of going back home. We returned frequently for breaks and vacations, but we never again lived in Montana. Our lives called us in new directions and we changed. Living in Chicago taught me a set of urban survival skills that I could not have cultivated in Montana. My small town had no public transportation. There were and still are no commuter trains in my home state. Driving on crowded urban freeways is different than driving on open country roads. I learned about locks and security. The adjustment to living in the city was hard for me. I kept locking the keys in the car. I felt restrained by the small amounts of space in our apartment and the number of locks that were required between our living space and the street. I had to cultivate a fear of dark places and learn to avoid cutting through alleys and across open areas.

I was changing in other ways as well. I was reading books – lots of books. I was attending classes and developing friendships with people from around the world. I heard lectures that pushed my thinking in new directions.

From Chicago, we moved to North Dakota and from there to Idaho and finally to South Dakota. All the while we were having new experiences, meeting new people, learning and growing.

I was aware of how much I was changing, but I sometimes didn’t notice how much the places I left had changed. This world isn’t static.

These days, when I go back to visit one of the places where I used to live, I notice that there are a lot of new buildings. This is true even in small and rural locations. The population in my hometown is about the same as it was when I was growing up, but the people occupy more and larger houses. There are a few homes in that town that belong to people who have multiple homes and use their home in that area only part of the year. But there are more changes than just the number and location of buildings.

Within five years of the time I moved away from home all of the sheep ranchers in the area had ceased trailing their sheep to the high pastures in the summer. It was a combination of factors. The cost of grazing leases on federal land was going up. There were pressures on that land for other uses. The technologies for hauling sheep and other items changed. Ranchers had bigger trucks. Semis started to appear in ranch yards. The margins of profit in ranching grew slimmer, forcing some out of the business. Those who remained were forced to get bigger in order to keep their operations viable. Bigger farms and ranches meant less people living on the land. Initially this meant more people moved to town. Gradually it meant that the average age of the folks in town went up. There were fewer children for the schools and more retired folks.

Everybody travels more these days. A trip to a nearby small city is routine. The nearest Wal-Mart is 60 miles away, but you can see the effects of the big box stores on Main Street in my hometown. The impacts of Internet shopping also have forced a change in businesses. The truth is that you probably can purchase a lot more things locally today in that town than was the case when I was growing up. But we have learned to want even more items. We see more objects as disposable and routinely consume items that we once thought were luxuries.

It is tempting to become nostalgic about the past. The danger with that kind of nostalgia is that our memories can become inaccurate. The past we long for is something that never existed. I can wax poetic about old time sheep men and cowboys but it wasn’t an easy life. Alcoholism and domestic violence were regular occurrences in those days even if we didn’t talk about them. The life of a ranch wife in the days before everyone had a car was a hard lot. There was isolation and loneliness. People suffered from improperly treated illnesses and injuries. Broken bones became crippling disabilities. Wax poetic about the outhouse, but it is a darn cold inconvenience at -20 degrees. And the life of the preacher was quite different than it is these days. I only lived in my hometown for 17 years, but I can name five preachers that served our little church in those years. A minister that lasted 4 years was an anomaly. There were always more ministers and the church just moved on. I wasn’t aware of conflict or tension, but I know today that it was there. I know that I no longer know how to live on the wages offered by small membership congregations.

Still, I feel lucky to have grown up in the time and place that I did. There was enough wild country left to get away from the sounds and lights of the city without much effort. We were free to wear cutoffs all summer and play in a wild river. We caught grasshoppers and used them for bait for fish that our mom cooked the same day they were caught. We ate meat from animals raised by ranchers we knew and supplemented that by hunting deer and antelope, with an occasional elk. We poured over the Sears and Montgomery Ward catalogues, but bought most of our Christmas presents from the dime store in town. If you couldn’t get it at the hardware store or one of the implement dealers, there was probably someone who could make what it was you needed. If not, you could learn to live without it.

The world is changing. We can’t go back. But there are treasures in our past that have lasting value. We do well to remember as accurately as possible.

Copyright © 2013 by Ted Huffman. I wrote this. If you want to copy it, please ask for permission. There is a contact me button at the bottom of this page. If you want to share my blog a friend, please direct your friend to my web site.