Small Town

I begrudgingly went to Hurley this weekend. I don't go there as often since my parents moved away. I feel weird staying with the people we stay with and I will leave it at that. J has become a part of their family and doesn't understand my uncomfortableness. That being said, a friend of mine from high school just had a baby, so I figured this would be a great chance to catch up and get my grubby hands on a bitty baby. Thankfully she agreed together.
I thought this would be a chance to also get some photos of the places I frequented growing up. I was heartbroken when I saw the park I had spent so much time at growing up. The blacktop had been fairly new, we had a skating rink every winter, which after being being plowed gave us a huge hill to play king of the hill on.
I went by my old house and it was painted a garish green, my old elementary school looked like a shipyard, which I totally didn't get. Maybe they repair boats there now. Even my old high school looked like a salvage yard. The only bright side was the swimming hole. They had a huge playground built up and apparently they have a real beach now. we swam next to the dock in the photo or sneaked on a private sandy beach. I was so let down by the others I didn't pursue it anymore and I ran out of time to run out to Lake Superior, which usually is never a let down.
I met up with my friend at her house. She has such a great location and a huge backyard for the kids to run around. Peanut Butter and her older 2 daughters played their hearts out. We caught up. We hadn't talked in years, it was really nice. For some reason I have been wanting to catch up with some of my better friends from high school. I don't know why. I was really happy to see how well she was doing and she has such a beautiful family. Her older girls are complete opposites, it was funny. The baby was the sweetest. She was so light in my arms, I couldn't believe I ever though that was heavy. She looks fantastic for just having a baby a month ago. I now have an urge to go up again sometime soon and catch up with some other peeps, maybe.
She at one point asked me if I missed living there. I said honestly, no. The only thing I missed was my friends it gets hard to keep up and the fact that I would like PB to go to school like we did. She probably graduated with 60 kids and I with 40. I can't imagine hundreds in one class. It is something I wrestle with in looking toward the future. While going to a bigger school may have prepared me better for the size of UW-Madison, I can't fathom graduating with people I know nothing about. She had lived in the Twin Cities for a while and said the only thing she really missed was the shopping, but hated the winters in Hurley. This is what I do not miss at all. I hated shoveling 2-3 times a day to keep up and the snow never seemed to melt.