I grew up in the foothills of the Berkshire Mountains, in a tiny little working class town tucked into the center of the Pioneer Valley. It was a thirty minute drive to the closest grocery store. There wasn't a single movie theater or mall within 45 minutes. My teachers in school had taught both my parents, who were high school sweethearts and married at 18 and 19. My dad, like my grandfather, worked his entire career in the paper mill situated by the river in the neighboring town.
I was always mystified when families would move into town from the city and my new neighbors would look at me incredulously and say with great sarcasm, "what do you do out here?" I remember thinking what a ridiculous question that was. Spring brought the annual canoe races where my cousins, aunts and uncles would sit on the bank behind my grandparents house watching to see who would capsize as the canoes and kayaks navigated the Spring time white water of the Westfield River. Summers were spent riding my bike to the small town library and racing home to curl up under an apple tree and get lost in a great adventure. Summer evenings there were adventures of our own catching fireflies and running from the boys chasing us with empty mayonnaise jars filled with nightcrawlers. Winters were full of snowmobiling followed by snow eating parties with delicious hot maple syrup poured over a sheet of snow. On the off weekend that I didn't have dance classes, I'd grab my ice skates and head to an ice covered alcove in a neighbors field, where I would ice skate until it was almost dark and my cheeks were rosy from the cold winter breeze.
It wasn't until I was in high school that I realized that growing up in the country was something to be ashamed of. Getting elected to the state student council meant monthly trips into Boston where I would meet with students from other cities across the state who all seemed so much more sophisticated than I was. So I learned to keep my country roots a secret. By the time I graduated from high school, I couldn't wait to escape from the smallness of my small town and get out into the real world where there were cities waiting for me to discover and a sophisticated, glamorous life waiting for me to live.
I learned to look with disdain at my small town, which seemed to get smaller the more I traveled and discovered the world. People who knew me post- small town upbringing were always shocked when they discovered I had grown up in the country. They would laugh and exclaim, "there is no way you grew up in the country!" I had done a great job of disguising my small town beginnings.
Today, I was returning to the small town my father had grown up in. It was the church my parents were married in. Today it was the church my uncle would be memorialized in. As I stepped inside the sanctuary I struggled to reconcile the simplicity and the smallness of the sanctuary with my girlhood memories of this same space, which had seemed so intimidating and cavernous to my six year old eyes. Today it was neither of those. Today, it was a small country church, in the center of a small New England town, looking almost exactly the same as it had over 45 years ago. It remained as it had always been.
These were country folk. This was a country church. Hand carved rafters of wood that had been polished to deep umber tones, simple stained glass windows that softened the sunlight, and a pipe organ in the very front and center of the small sanctuary, held a place of honor in the wood encased choir loft.
I crowded into the same wooden pews that I remembered from long ago and sat next to my parents as the memorial service began. It was a beautiful service. Simple yet sincere stories told by tearful children and grandchildren about a man who had lived and died in this small country town. They spoke of him as their hero. They cried as they told about the amazing love story he shared with their mother - for 66 years. The tiny sanctuary echoed with the sounds of family and friends struggling to hold back tears for a man who had lived a life of quiet integrity and devotion to family in a very small town.
The pastor had opened the service by reassuring all of us that he was not going to preach a sermon. Yet there was a sermon preached that morning that will perhaps be one of the most profound I have ever heard. It was the message of a life lived by a man who had the wisdom to know and the courage to hold onto that which was truly important. Faith, family, honesty, integrity. It was a very large message lived out simply and quietly in a very small town.
As I sat in the carved wooden pew, wiping away tears, I finally embraced the legacy that I had been struggling with most of my life. Perhaps for the first time, I recognized the profound gift that I had been given. I quietly slipped my feet out of my designer heels and wiggled my toes. I prayed a silent prayer. I was thanking God I was a country girl.
