Article: 261403 of talk.bizarre
From: john@thunder.ofps.ucar.edu (John J. Allison)
Newsgroups: talk.bizarre
Subject: jeanna
Date: 1 Dec 1995 19:15:27 GMT
Organization: Office of Field and Stream Project Support
Lines: 27
Message-ID: <49nk8f$lsg@ncar.ucar.edu>
Reply-To: john@ofps.ucar.edu
Status: O
X-Status: 

In the end, Jeanna came to here senses, but we were in doubt for some time.
She was acting kind of crazy; I mean, when a beautiful girl like that
just up and leaves town. Sure she was 18 and free to do what she pleased,
but that didn't stop her momma and daddy from worrying; at least she sent
postcards. First one was from Vegas - she said she was going to marry a
bona fide drugstore cowboy: Not quite the romantic Old West vision I
had, she wrote, but they only give those hats to real cowboys, right?
Well the next postcard came from Missoula; this time she was going to marry
a rancher who wore a John Deere baseball cap; at least there's some good
fishing up that way, said her dad. Then she took a train to the end of
the line - San Francisco, and the bridge was still there, but it was sunny:
no fog. "I'm coming home soon" she wrote. When she came back, she looked
the same, and she pretty much acted the same, too. I guess she never really
did get married, but from that point on, she knew what she wanted out
of life. It wasn't that she "found herself" on that trip; it wasn't that
the big bad world scared her back home, or that she really "came to her
senses", either- she just needed some time to organize herself. On the
road with no schedule and no worries can do that for some people; other
people fall apart. They're the ones who end up in big cities; the constant
crush of other people like themselves helps keep everyone together. But
Jeanna got organized; now she can live in a small town. Small towns aren't
dead ends; they're not stifling. The lower density gives you room to grow;
the looseness gives you room to leave. If you can't keep yourself together
without help, though, you'll just float apart- disintegrate. A natural
selection to keep these towns small.
-- 
, jja