Significant Place, Rupert

               Rupert is a rural town in southern Idaho with a population of 5,645.  It’s the kind of town that goes back generations, where last names mean more than fancy college degrees, and farming is as respectable of a profession as owning a business.
                We lived in a small house on the river my mom had lived in before she went to college.  Just down the road lived my grandparents.  When I was 4, my dad had had enough of his too close, over-powering mother in law, along with his own parents a few miles away, watching every move he made.  Our family moved to Oregon and returned to Rupert every year for family reunions on both sides of the family.  Grandma and Grandpa Heiner’s dairy was a museum of dead farm animals, whose skulls always looked better on Grandma’s porch rather than in the field.  Their house was a place of laughter, good food, and board game after board game, and hours of swimming in the canal.  Then, for the fourth of July, we’d switch to my mom’s side of the family for the Rupert parade, boating, and fireworks.
                After six liberal, tree hugging years we moved back home because of Grandpa Heiner’s failing battle with cancer.  While looking for a place to buy, we stayed with Grandma and Grandpa Heiner.  House hunting went from one month to six and we came to know our grandpa like we never had.  Eventually, we found a house in town and settled in.
                Rupert is a small town and so are the people in it.  My business is your business and your business is everyone else’s.  There are no secrets or stories that haven’t been heard, and no faces unrecognized.  Everyone knows each other’s parents and grandparents.  Having lived elsewhere, I saw Rupert for what it is.  Sometimes I would suffocate, feeling trapped in a town or school that isn’t going anywhere.  I would make plans for escape, of running away, plans I’d never follow through on, but was comforted nonetheless.  I wanted to go on to bigger and better things, but I still loved Rupert.  I loved the farms, fields, the river, canals, sunsets, and most of all, the people.  The familiar faces I’ve known all my life, who’ve watched me grow as they stay exactly the same.  I love the teachers who taught my parents at the same schools I went to.

                My dad went to jail and my parents got divorced, and the whole town watched and supported.  My mom struggled to take care of us, and had countless faithful customers at her salon, customers who received haircuts as often as they could spare the hair, not because they loved her work, but because they loved her as an individual, loved my family, and wanted to help.

                After my mom got remarried and we moved away, we continue to return to visit.  I’ve noticed how run down the houses are, the cracked side walks ad weathered buildings.  The closest mall is 45 minutes away, there is one grocery store and only a handful of restaurants.  This was annoying when I lived there but seems unbearable now.  The styles have stayed the same since middle school, along with the hairdos.  Nothing changes and that drove me crazy when I lived there, but I’d be crazy not to love every bit of Rupert for what it is and how it’s shaped me.  I don’t want to live there again, but I will never regret the time and love spent.  And I will never miss a Rupert fourth of July Parade.