From a small town

Sometimes, I find that I have to sit down and face reality, and recently I've been thinking a lot about home.  I lived in Colorado for 5 years, and when I moved to Washington I thought I would never claim  my little town as my home... As it turns out, I was wrong.  I've now lived here for 8 years, and since I've been at college for the last year, I've been calling O-town (as we like to call it here) my home.  But in all reality, I think I've considered it home since the time I was a freshmen in High School.

The reason I care about being from a small town, especially today, is because I just went to the best concert I've ever been to in my entire life; Kenny Chesney's No Shoes Nation Tour.  Now, Kenny Chesney is also from a small town... Somewhere in Tennessee... and he is very proud of that.  He sings the following songs about small towns;
1) Back where I come from
2) Where I grew up
3) In a small town
4) I'm a small town (notice the similar names...)
5) I go back

Trust me, there are more, but these are the really obvious ones... But this post is about more than just Kenny Chesney songs, and it's about more than being from a small town... I guess it's kind of about both...?

So lets start out with a short review of the concert; honestly, it was fantastic.  I missed out on the first opening act, Kacey Musgraves. But she came out for the song Come Over with Kenny Chesney, and she has a beautiful voice.  I also saw nothing but the tail end of the Eli Young Band, how was also great.

Eric Chruch was up next, and I'll be honest, he was a little strange, but hilarious and fun to watch.  I'm still a little confused as to why he took boots from audience members, signed them, and then gave them to other people... Like, now two people only have one shoe. but whatever... he also took two beers from audience members and drank them, meanwhile spilling them all over his shirt... Obviously, he didn't want other people's cooties. Over all, though, he was great too. There really wasn't a bad act on the tour.

My family was worried Kenny Chesney would be playing all songs from his new album, which is a total snoozer. (I could do homework to it, no problem) But he only played three; everything else were his most popular hits from the last 20 years! And it was awesome.  My family loved it, we knew every song and we sang along the whole time.

But some of the real entertainment came from the people in the audience around us. The woman in the couple in front of us was so drunk and horny it was disgusting.  And the girl across the aisle was flirting with every male that walked by because "she was going to find a boyfriend that way."  Uh--huh... I'm sure that will work really well for you...


And then there is my lovely small home town, and despite being in Western Washington, it's quite similar to the town Kenny Chesney is from.  There's cows, farms, hicks, football, girls... all the necessary requirements.

The only difference is I have no intentions of living here in the future... Not saying Kenny is going to be back there some day; but I will not be back, living here, ever again.   I'll drive through some day and be like; kids, I used to live there! but that's it.  In the meantime, I will forever love the friends I've made here, the time I spent here and I will always have pride in being a graduate from my High School.  But that's about it.

So thanks, Kenny, for the home town reminiscing... Sometimes that's just what you need to realize how grateful you are for your home town (and it's a little reminder for where you don't want to be in your future).

-Katelynn René