Dear Editor,
A week has passed since I sat among old friends in a smoky cellar on the Square and reminisced about my “formative” years in Neosho.
Surrounded by girls who knew me better than I often knew myself, I realized that Neosho will always be my home, no matter where I live.
I came home this time for the funeral of my best friend’s father. Four years earlier I had been home for my own father’s funeral. This time, like the last, we were all there — me and these wonderful women who have long trusted me with their childhood secrets and young girls’ dreams.
When I looked around the table at those smiling faces, I didn’t see mothers or grandmothers who have experienced the joys and heartaches of raising their families. I saw the girls who piled into my father’s car when we collected enough gas money to cruise “the Square” on Saturday night. I saw the girls who packed up sleeping bags and bathing suits and headed to Grand Lake to escape the homecoming weekend when none of us had dates. I saw the girls who stood in line with me as we received our high school diplomas. I saw the girls who waved “goodbye” when I moved away.
Wasn’t it just yesterday that I left Neosho to make a new life in another city?
How could I drive away from the streets and backroads I knew by heart? How could I miss the weddings and the childbirths and the birthdays? How could I ever say “goodbye” to these girls who never, ever, turned their backs on me?
Sometimes you just hit the road and drive.
Sometimes you know where you are headed; other times you just go where the road takes you. I’m so thankful that I know the road that takes me home, and the girls who meet me there.
Sincerely,
Jill Cornett
Kansas City
