Ultimate Compliment

I was driving with a friend on Monday who is from this area. She and I know each other through our kids. We have always enjoyed each other's company and often have coffee together. She is someone I truly admire and respect. I also just love her artistic flair, quirkiness, sense of style and sense of humor. I sometimes long to be more like her.

We cross the Madisonville Bridge and I tell her about the Wooden Boat Festival.

So she starts telling me about a book she is reading and how it reminds her of me. She explains the story and I don't get how it reminds her of me. So I ask. She says, "Because you embrace the world around you. You are not from here and you embrace everything about living here. You immerse yourself into your evironment."

I was taken aback at the comment for a minute. It was coming from somone I think does the same. What a super compliment to receive.

She went on. "Do you know how many people who have lived here their whole lives have never been to the Wooden Boat Festival?"

We went on to discuss how I have lived in 3 other states and have loved each one of them in different way and for very different reasons. It is all what you make of it. It is all in your ability to adjust and accept. Part of loving where you live is understanding it and discovering it. I guess I naturally do that wherever I go.

I have worked with people who have worked in the same place since they left college. They would complain endlessly about their job. I would think, "You don't know how good you have it."

Same goes with living somewhere your whole life. Unless you have left and lived elsewhere you often don't know how good you have it. Every place can be enjoyed for what it has to offer. Some are definitely better than others and more preferred but make the best of where you live and what you have.

Immerse yourself!