Big dreams!

I never had an October Sky moment.

In the 1999 movie October Sky, Homer Hickam becomes interested in rocket science after seeing Sputnik cross the sky and the start of the Space Age. With the help of his friends, Homer, played by Jake Gyllenhaal, is determined to launch his own rocket. He hopes that it will be his ticket out of Coalwood, West Virginia.

In one tense moment in the movie, Homer’s father tries to get him to give up on the dream and become a coal miner. Homer sticks up for himself. “If I go onto win (the science fair) at Indianapolis, I can go to college, maybe even get a job at Cape Canaveral. There’s nothing here for me. The town is dying! The mine is dying! Everybody here knows that but you!”

His father thinks Homer’s being disrespectful and says that maybe he should leave. Homer replies that once he’s gone, he’ll be gone forever and won’t look back!

I felt the same way as Homer. Oh I grew up in a nice area with lovely people, but I had bigger dreams. I knew that I wanted more out of life. I wanted to change my stars.

Like Coalwood, many of the other 120 or so kids in my high school graduating class stayed local. They found work at the hospital or steel mill or in construction, trucking, or working on farms. Some others enlisted in the Armed Forces. A smaller group went off to college.

Image by Pixabay.

Change your stars

When I said I wanted to leave, my parents wanted to know how I was going to make it happen. They worried about the finances. A few friends gave me strange looks. Some others questioned me on why I would “want to move away” from everything I knew. They wondered what was so great about the suburbs or city life.

My path was smoother than Homer’s, but I still had my challenges. I didn’t have a make-or-break moment with my father. I still needed to find the words to tell others what I wanted out of life at a time when I didn’t even know.

Fortunately I found comfort in small things like the time an elementary teacher took a few kids from our class “across the mountain” to the big college town for a celebratory dinner. Years later, it hit me that she did this throughout the school year for everyone in the class. In her own small way, she was trying to broaden our horizons (on a starting teacher’s salary.)

When we drove through the campus, she slowed her car to a crawl so that she could point to academic buildings and classrooms. She wanted to show us what else was out there in the world.

She helped open my eyes.

I think I can, I think I can

When I was older, I took full advantage of school trips to Washington, D.C. or Philadelphia. I liked getting out of class just as much as the next guy, but those trips were “ink-circle” days. I was excited to see where my studies could take me.

Finally, I took courage from stories like Rocky (1976), Breaking Away (1979), Chariot’s of Fire (1981), Vision Quest (1985), Stand by Me (1986), Hoosiers (1986), and Dead Poet’s Society (1989). The stories reminded me that we all have some of the kid’s book “The Little Engine That Could” deep inside of us.

I celebrated when Rocky surprised the more talented Apollo Creed. I cheered when Dave, the biking enthusiast in Breaking Away and his working-class friends beat the snooty college kids in the Little 500 at Indiana University. Some of the stories were clichés or told in the corniest of fashions, but they still worked. They showed people who persevered, believed in themselves, and triumphed.

Mainly they gave me hope.

Making a dream a reality

Despite it all, I’ve long wondered why I felt the urge to leave the cocoon of small town life. Why it hit me but not the next guy or girl? The urge to leave home was like a heart beat beating five times faster than it should. It was so loud I could hear the thump-thump-thump in my head. On top of it, the beating never went away. It never slowed or gave up. It was with me constant.

I attribute four key reasons:

–Being authentic. I recognized that getting out was my best chance to be myself. I respected my mother’s story. I’ve written about her a few times in the past. She grew up in a sheltered Amish community, but left when she was a young girl. Like her, I wanted more. Authenticity has always been important to me. Leaving represented my best chance to be myself.

–Following my passion. I wanted my life to mean something. I wanted more. Like Homer, I was fine with with a strong work ethic. I respected those who worked hard. I didn’t think I was better than anybody else. The small town life and jobs though weren’t for me. I wanted to write. I wanted follow my creative instincts.

–Searching for more. Like many of the folks in my community, I rooted for Penn State University, the college that sat about a hour away from where I lived. The drive went fast, but it may as well have been a million miles away.

Many in my small town rooted for Penn State’s football team each Saturday in the fall. They loved the watching the Nittany Lions on the field, but barely gave the school’s academic reputation a second thought. They didn’t know that Penn State had nationally recognized Engineering and Medical Programs. They knew nothing about the many Liberal Arts offerings. They never wandered anywhere close to a classroom. I couldn’t understand that. If they wanted something to root for, then I figured they should go root for a professional football team in Philadelphia, Pittsburgh or New York. For me, I wanted to know what happened far away from the football field. I wanted to see the real action — in the classroom.

–Finding happiness. Oh, I have a deep appreciation for the area and I love to go back. I get a lot of joy going visiting family and friends. It will always be a part of me. I just never wanted to live out my days there. I wanted to do more with my life.

What about you? Have you ever wanted to live somewhere else? How have you fought expectations in your life?