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How small is it?

14 November 2008 5 Comments

No, this isn’t a joke response to a recent joke I heard… so pull your brains from the muck now please. ;)

A couple of folks have asked me what I meant by small, when I said I live in a small, rural town. Actually, I had someone ask what I meant by rural…but I’m pretty sure he was being a brat. He’s been here, so he knows what I mean.

Thanks to Rusty, who made me curious to begin with, I went and Googled the town. Yup, for whatever reason I can now see the satellite pics, so I snagged it and here ya go. This – THIS – is what I mean by small town. North at the top, east to the right, and so on.

Miami

That oval thing at the bottom is the half-mile race track where, twice a year, we have harness racing, and once a year, we have a rodeo. Don’t ask me about cowboys, I ain’t got nuttin’ nice to say about these ones. Anyway, the track is a half-mile, now compare it to the town. Get it? Got it?

Good. Wait for it…

Small town. Oh, and that pic is at least two years old. The street at the top of town has six more houses on it, I think… well, the entire south side of the block is filled now, and there’s at least one more on the north side. And the train track you can barely see just above the highway (yellow) is gone now. They pulled it out last summer, and picked up the ties and whatnot this summer. Now, it’s kinda like a path/walkway. It’s sad. :(

And now – here’s the place I grew up, about 18 miles south of Miami. I lived here, but went to school and did everything else in another town, although for a portion of my pre-school years there was still a store, a lumberyard, a garage and grain elevators. Those are all gone now. When my mom grew up here, the town was twice the size than it is now. Huge school, several stores, etc.

Thornhill

You can see the streets are in the right place in Miami, but aren’t in Thornhill. *rolls eyes*

Back to editing and avoiding NaNoWriMo!

5 Comments »

  • cate said:

    WOW! I’ve always wanted to live in a place like that, and to be have a white picket house and to be married to the sherriff – small dreams. :)

    # 15 November 2008 at 3:13 am
  • JodiLee (author) said:

    hehehe – no sheriffs around here – at least, not the kind I bet you’re thinking of. ;)

    The great thing? That piece of property between St.John and Edward, that block there – that was all my family, until my grandparent’s passed and the house was sold (it’s under the St.John print). That was my yard as a kid, since my grandparents were on the east side of our place, and my aunt and uncle’s summer house was to the west.

    At the very bottom of the pic, that used to be my grandparent’s store and lumberyard, so I had that huge area, too. And all the bush surrounding the town… *sigh* There are more forts out in those woods than is necessary for any child, I’m sure.. LOL

    # 15 November 2008 at 3:53 am
  • Kevin said:

    I grew up in, well on the outskirts, of a small town like the one at the bottom. Now I live in a city of some odd millions of people. LOL

    The layout of the top one reminds me of the map of New Bedlam >:)

    # 15 November 2008 at 3:03 pm
  • Cate said:

    I think you should set a novel there and put your old town on the map. :)

    # 16 November 2008 at 4:02 am
  • JodiLee (author) said:

    hehehe

    Well, New Bedlam is loosely based off both towns, actually. The weirdness of my hometown, spread out over a slightly larger version of where I live now.

    Someday soon, I’ll actually have time to work on what started as my NaNovel – also set in New Bedlam hehehe ;)

    # 20 November 2008 at 1:42 am