Look, I’m not going to lie to you – I grew up dreaming of my escape from Bay City and Matagorda County.
I even tried to attend college at an unreasonable distance to ensure that I was in a place where no one knew me, my family, my hometown, or county.
Weirdly enough, that didn’t work 100% because I managed to find a handful of other coastal dwellers and one Bay City native when I was at Angelo State University.
However, it was enough and I had other connections on Facebook to keep up with what was going down on the local radar.
Looking back, it seems like social media was in its toddler years and not as widespread back then, too.
Still, once I returned home to care for my aging grandmother,
I started to get more involved locally and I’ve seen the growth happening in real time.
That being said, when mom, my sister and I traveled to visit my brother in Wylie last weekend the whole place gave me an eerie sense of déjà vu.
The location of his house honestly reminded me of Needville’s “Blue Jay’s Landing” up the road – older homes with some land squished between overpriced subdivisions an annoying amount of poorly striped and marked areas of road construction.
Granted the weather was drier, but it was still disgustingly hot, so we made sure to enjoy the power of my brother’s air conditioner accordingly – 70 degrees or lower for maximum comfort.
ERCOT is still insane to think anyone is following their recommended setting of 78 degrees!
And though we only spent time at his home to sleep or prepare to leave, all of our other excursions happened 30-45 minutes away in Plano or Sachse and even longer and further away in Dallas proper.
In my mind, the time spent driving only further mirrored what living in Bay City was like, too.
I mean, there isn’t much difference from those adventure destinations and having to travel to Houston, Sugar Land, or Lake Jackson, for some reason or another.
In fact, my sister and I both noticed the sheer amount of driving around we were doing in comparison to our usual Bay City romps when she comes home to visit.
I may have found it a little more entertaining than she did, but the overall amusement was shared with mom, too.
Still, most of all, it seemed to boil down to the fact that both of my siblings still prefer living in their chosen locales versus here.
And I get it from a career-related convenience standpoint!
However, I’m in the same boat living here in Bay City and Matagorda County.
Luckily, with my job here at the newspaper, I get to hear about and see growth firsthand.
For example, construction has started on the aquatic center, we finally have a Taco Bell again, and it seems like I’m hearing about new small businesses on the horizon every few weeks.
While some parts of the community are still cornerstones of my childhood, they have also expanded or renovated themselves to continue moving forward into the future.
Honestly, I think that’s the best anyone can ask for, even when you get the itch to leave the nest as soon as you’re an adult.
Sometimes coming back home with a fresh perspective can do wonders – even when your siblings are hours apart and you miss them terribly.