In my dreams last night I was back in Exeter. My brain likes to run home on occasion and I’ve been thinking about it all morning.
We love our little town. I loved the home we’d purchased there and we’d made some really nice improvements to it in the four years we were there. We had a nice detached garage we converted into a living space our oldest daughter, son-in-law, and granddaughter lived in for a while. When they moved on, Taylor, our youngest daughter took it over. The idea was to turn it into Kim’s She Shed when Taylor moved out. As it turns out that never happened because we moved east to Virginia.
I grew up in Exeter from sixth grade on. I graduated high school in Exeter. Kim and I were married in Exeter in 1987. Aside from a brief stint in Seattle we raised two children there and got to see our first grandchild begin life there.
In all honesty I’d like to move back. There, I said the quiet part out loud. ☺️
If we moved back I could remain at WillowTree because I’m in our Work from Anywhere group. Knowing I could do that makes me smile because I really do enjoy my work and the people at WillowTree. My sincerest hope is to retire from WillowTree when I hit 70. Hopefully they’ll allow me to stay that long.
I miss a lot of things about the San Joaquin Valley and Exeter in general. Silly things like Exeter Coffee Company where socializing is encouraged and I took advantage of that. I miss Kirkman’s VIP Pizza. We got pizza there every Saturday night, Kim indulged me that. I miss Frosty King, a local Mom and Pop burger joint that did everything just right.
Mostly I miss family and the people of our little town. Our neighborhood was wonderful and we had great neighbors we could share with or just shoot the breeze with while out mowing lawns.
I’d always dreamed of running a little hyper local news site – blog – that filled gaps left open by our local paper, the Sun Gazette (who are doing amazing local journalism.)
My dreams of being an Indie Developer have been a constant and I’d always imagined owning a certain building in Exeter and making our home and my Indie Software there. The building I’d still love to have is the old Exeter Bank of America building, complete with a nifty old vault! The building is a beautiful two story affair that had received a lot of love in recent times but the second floor was never converted. I always imagined the second floor as our home an my little Indie office.
I think it’s safe to say I’m more than a little delusional. But those hopes and dreams keep me going when I get down. For some strange reason I still believe a lot of this will magically happen some day.
If it never does, that’s fine. I’ve had an extremely wonderful life, filled with great joy, friends, and family I love to be around. As I’ve aged those friend and family connections have become more important to me than any house or town, but I still dream of Exeter.