Dayton.
I left Ohio once, in August 2006, to live with my sister in Oklahoma. It was supposed to be permanent. I came home in November. It wasn’t that we didn’t get along or I hated her new boyfriend – we didn’t get along, but that wasn’t the biggest reason. I missed Ohio. It was something I never expected because I had lived there my whole life, in the same house, in East Dayton. But there was something missing in Oklahoma. First of all, there was almost no construction. There are those who have said there are four seasons in Ohio: winter, almost winter, just after winter, and construction. I missed the orange barrels that they taught in driver’s ed were filled with rocks and cement to persuade us to fear them. I wonder if other states get that same lecture. Dayton is small, but not too small. We get first-run movies and even the weird independent ones at the Neon. We have an extremely healthy theatre life in Dayton, where you can see plays at the Victoria Theatre or the new Schuster Center. We have the Dayton Art Institute if art is your thing. We actually matter in presidential elections. The Air Force Museum continues to amaze. Columbus is close, but not too close – it’s about an hour and a half, no matter how fast you drive. And yes, we measure distance by how long it takes to get there.
Oklahoma was flat. The weather was atrocious – blistering heat in the summer that switches at the drop of the hat to car-denting hail and then a tornado you can seriously see coming about 50 miles away. I was used to Ohio’s fluctuating temperatures (60, 20, 90, 10) but I was not ready for biblical weather. It’s always pleasantly grey-ish in Ohio. And green as well – Oklahoma is brown everywhere, from lack of rain and spectactular amounts of dust. When my sister visits she always comments on the greenness of Ohio, like she’s been transported into The Wizard of Oz and everything just went from black-and-white to technicolor.
Ohio is boring, there is no doubt. It’s not New York or California by a long shot. But there is something special about Ohio and it’s something I am unable to communicate. It’s Ohio. Ohioans know what it is, and I wonder if any of us know how to properly state what is is about Ohio that makes people like it here so much. Dayton is like a microcosm to me, like a mini “real” city. I can get anything I want from Dayton – books, movies, art, clothes, museums, historical centers, and celebrities. Martin Sheen is even on the board of the Peace Museum. It is amazing here, and I cannot imagine any place being the same.
Oklahoma was flat. The weather was atrocious – blistering heat in the summer that switches at the drop of the hat to car-denting hail and then a tornado you can seriously see coming about 50 miles away. I was used to Ohio’s fluctuating temperatures (60, 20, 90, 10) but I was not ready for biblical weather. It’s always pleasantly grey-ish in Ohio. And green as well – Oklahoma is brown everywhere, from lack of rain and spectactular amounts of dust. When my sister visits she always comments on the greenness of Ohio, like she’s been transported into The Wizard of Oz and everything just went from black-and-white to technicolor.
Ohio is boring, there is no doubt. It’s not New York or California by a long shot. But there is something special about Ohio and it’s something I am unable to communicate. It’s Ohio. Ohioans know what it is, and I wonder if any of us know how to properly state what is is about Ohio that makes people like it here so much. Dayton is like a microcosm to me, like a mini “real” city. I can get anything I want from Dayton – books, movies, art, clothes, museums, historical centers, and celebrities. Martin Sheen is even on the board of the Peace Museum. It is amazing here, and I cannot imagine any place being the same.
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