NORTH BEND HEROES START HERE

 Calling North Bend a small town is a disservice to real small towns everywhere.

Driving south on 101 and crossing the North Bend Bridge takes you under this sign.

If you’re not paying close attention and keep going the same direction, the entire area of the largest metro complex on the Oregon coast feels like it’s all North Bend, especially if you miss the little coos bay sign.

How can the biggest city on the coast be a small town?

When I think of small town I think of a feeder town at a crossroads where people come in for supplies then go back home.

It’s a big event planned for weeks.

A suburban Costco fills the same role where people pull up in their wagons. Station wagons.

It’s a crossroads deal where people from all walks of life gather with shopping carts and big flatbeds.

One person checks out with one cooked chicken in their cart; another leaves with thousands of dollars worth of stuff on a flatbed.

You leave North Bend, but you never check out, and you take every memory with you.

 

How To Celebrate A State Championship

This the state champion band from North Bend. They stopped traffic for the shot, and had to have stopped band judges when they played.

Did the state champion wrestling team from 1979 get a similar picture?

Every champion ought to be required to stand under the sign for a picture and enshrined in city hall.

If this were a small town it would have been happening for decades.

 

 

History has a funny way of remembering things, like anyone who got second place in anything.

People like winners, and there’s only one.

But even winners get forgotten over time.

How many times have you heard someone recall their time in the spotlight and left you wondering if the dimmer switch of time  changed their story?

Eventually everyone is a winner and everyone is a loser.

That’s when you need to sort it out, sort your feelings, your recollections, and let them rest.

Like Kenny Rogers said:

 

Every gambler knows
That the secret to surviving
Is knowing what to throw away
And knowing what to keep
‘Cause every hand’s a winner
And every hand’s a loser
And the best that you can hope for
Is to die in your sleep.

 

Yes, you were great, but did you win back-to-back titles?

You are a winner, but did you win an Olympic gold medal? Only one?

Too many times we get judged for our accomplishments by those who’ve done less.

You ran a marathon, but not under two hours?

If you come from the right town, you know the answers: Every time you pass under the North Bend sign you feel like a winner.

 

The Winning Age

My readers, my audience, knows I harbor no ill will.

Do some things get under my skin? They do, but I’m a picker so it doesn’t last.

What I like to say is the effort you put out to achieve your greatest success is the sort of effort you need to apply to your problems.

If you have other conditions, ignore this, but if you don’t, start making your championship list.

First, your problems. If you’re a baby boomer this will make more sense.

Can you still tie your shoes? Will all the ads for slip-on shoes, who buys them?

Follow up question: Can you still clip your toenails?

It sounds silly until you look into a nail salon and ask yourself why everyone in the chairs look so similar.

Do you do yoga? If you did you’d be able to tie your shoes and clip your toenails.

If you live in North Bend, or the town you grew up in, you see people change in real time.

They’re up, they’re down, over here, over there, and the changes reflect where they are in their lives.

Do I regret leaving my hometown’s familiar surroundings? Yes, I do, but I wouldn’t change anything if I could.

I would have married the same wife I married, but we would have met in a different place.

Instead of the sidewalk on NW 21st and Lovejoy, we would have met when she stopped in town while driving up the coast with her boyfriend.

I would have been pumping gas when they stopped to fill up, our eyes meeting, sparks a flying.

She dumps her dude, we get married and have the same kids we have now, but they’d be Bulldogs, and we’d live happily ever after.

That’s not a far stretch from the way things started in Portland, and we’ve lived happily after that.

All I can say is, “It happens with the right people,” and she’s the right people.

 

PS:

Even if you try to forget, you’ll always remember where you come from.

For better or worse, you carry the legacy of your hometown.

It will never change.

 

PSS:

To the readers who call bullshit on change I say this: You will change, your town will change, but the memory of how you felt while you were there goes on and on.

How does it feel looking back to when your parents were still alive and married, when your friends all had their own hopes and dreams to share, when you saw a future taking shape in the clouds of time?

Coming from North Bend it feels pretty damn good.