Going home with "The Way Life Should Be"

When you grow up in a small town, one of your earliest goals is usually to get the hell out as soon as possible. At least that’s the way it was for me and my friends in Corry, Pennsylvania, population 7,500.

Our parents, on the other hand, would always lecture us about what a great place Corry was to raise a family, and we’d roll our eyes and groan. Now that I’m as ancient as my parents were when they used to preach that sermon, I have to agree. Their point was driven home further than ever when my wife and I pulled into the public library parking lot after driving from our home in Knoxville, Tennessee.

“I hope we get at least ten people,” I told Beth, who looked at me skeptically, since I hadn’t done much to get the word out about the reading from my first novel, “The Way Life Should Be.”

The place was packed.

My pals at “The Corry Journal” had taken care of that. Old friends, neighbors, teachers and classmates (and even a good friend from Gather) filled the rows of chairs. Some stood in the back. Others were along the walls.

I saw many for the first time in 20 years. One was our old mailman. I asked about his grandson, an Army Ranger who’d been wounded in Iraq.

“He’s doing just fine,” he said. “In fact, he re-enlisted.”

I already knew this, along with the fact that the town held a parade when he came home from the hospital. You see, I’d gone to high school with his parents and word spreads quickly, even to someone like me, who rarely gets back and whose family is now scattered around the country.

My seventh grade homeroom teacher told the newspaper stories about me. A friend of my mother’s showed up after bowling and proudly displayed the shirt from the team my brother still sponsors, even though he moved his business 700 miles away. My cousin apologized for a family emergency that cut her stay short.

Eventually I read my prologue and decided against continuing to the first chapter since there were a handful of kids in the audience. I could usually tell which ones belonged where at first glance.

“I knew your father when he was your age,” I told a nine-year-old.

He gave me a fake look of shock. “I didn’t know he was ever that young.”

“Yes,” I said. “And as much of a wiseguy.”

I signed a lot of books. One was to a friend’s baby sister. She’s now a judge, but instead of signing the book “To the Honorable Brenda Williams Nichols,” I wrote “To Binkie.”

Minna Stahl, the 10^th grade English teacher who instilled a lifelong love of Shakespeare remained “Mrs. Stahl.” Despite her eighty-some years, she managed to swat me across the head. That’s because my sloppy handwriting hasn’t gotten any better since high school.

A few were guys from the local Foamex factory who always encouraged me as a writer during the summers I worked there during college so many years ago. I doubt that their eyes welled up while I inscribed their copies, but mine did.

Afterward a bunch of us went to the old public library, which had been converted into a restaurant and bar. (Another friend was responsible for that. He figured a guy could have a perfect excuse to go out for a drink if he just told his wife he was heading down to the library.)

It was a perfect evening. The next morning I took a run through the small town and was grateful as memories poured out, block after block. Just before we checked out of our hotel, I got a call from Mr. Lindsey, my eighth grade history teacher. He apologized for missing the event, but he’d been out of town. He knew we’d stopping into the Journal before we left town and wanted a book for himself and a copy for the historical society’s museum.

“I’m just so proud of all of you kids,” he said. Then we went on to talk about Corry’s Little League All-Star girls softball team, which won the Pennsylvania state championship this summer. They even came a few breaks away from being national champions. Though I’d downed a few the night before with a friend who was the assistant coach (and the proud father of a player), he’d never mentioned just how far the team had actually gone.

Instead, he was just amazed by the number of people from Corry who traveled hundreds of miles away to watch the games. And as I sit here now, writing in the early hours from a hotel room in Portland, Maine, how can I not be proud of being from a town like that?