Couldn't Wait to Get Out

The small town I grew up in, I thought, was a backwater, a blinder, a coffin, a ball and chain. I plotted my escape during long liturgical rituals of Lutheran church services. While we read the Nicene Creed, I dreamed of snow-capped mountains, clear trout streams, and low humidity. But more than the places, I wanted a bigger horizon to my little mental maps. There was something out there that I just had to taste. So I left. I hitchhiked out west reading Nietzsche and Pirsig. I dabbled in the virtues of hoboism and poverty and sleeping in bushes. I can't say I found an answer, but I did lose some innocence. I have to find my way back now to things like common courtesy, contentment, the joy of rain. An old man, I can no longer rely on my body to carry me forward. I didn't blow it, exactly, but didn't gather much that I want to pass on those looking, like I was, for something better.