The biggest takeaway from my trip to my hometown of Loudonville, OH on October 17 is that it really felt like home--like no other place I've ever lived. After all, having moved there from Akron at age 10, this is where I developed who I was--my personality, my beliefs, my convictions, my tastes, my affinities, my dreams.

Sure, I was afraid of things then but nothing like today, because I wasn't trying to protect anything really. Rather, I was trying to become something for the future. I wasn't sinning anything remotely near what I am today. I was, in fact, pretty innocent, as well as naive.

Getting off at the Sunbury exit of I-71N was when the journey home, after a 24-year absence, really started to take hold of me. I knew that road because of how many times we took it to Columbus and back.