Motivation from Home

Well, I’m here. After nearly 24 hours of traveling, I have safely arrived back in Pennsylvania. Sights and sounds of my youth greet me at every turn, and I find myself entering a zone of comfort that only total familiarity can provide. These feelings of contentment have dominated my psyche, and driven me towards high expectations for what I may achieve while at home. Unfortunately, an emotion all too common in Northwestern Pennsylvania has begun to reveal itself. I feel it all around me, influencing all of my actions. Like quicksand, every attempt to free myself causes me to sink further into its unholy clutches. Now, many of you who have read my writings before may recognize the tone as a prelude to a further lament of my inherent laziness. While this is a good guess, it’s altogether incorrect. The feelings of malaise that I have begun to experience are not due to my own personal deficiencies, but by the very nature of my hometown. Therefore, I would like to introduce the nature of my community in order to shed some light onto one of the (many) reasons that I have become a past and future globetrotter, and why the feelings of abject apathy are nothing out of the ordinary.

To begin, I use the word “hometown” to describe Oil City, Franklin, and a few smaller towns that make up the immediate area. I do this because this term is convenient and sufficiently generic enough to sum up the area that I consider my “home.” After all, I am from a very rural era that retains its luster only for those with fond memories of a more prosperous past. Many of these people talk with pride (somewhat justifiably) about the area’s impact on world history. It was in my hometown that oil was first actively refined for eventual human over consumption. With the growth of the oil industry, the famous tycoon John Rockefeller entered the fray and used the area to help create the Standard Oil Company. This corporation eventually gave way to the modern brands (notably Pennzoil and Quaker State) which still exist today. Unfortunately, the companies decided to leave and since the early 90’s my community has drifted into an inescapable quagmire of disillusionment and apathy. It was as a part of this social and economic depression that I formulated my worldview and vowed never to stay in an area so obviously past its prime. Sadly, a majority of my former peers have not had the same good fortune, and therefore have fallen victim to the kind of lethargy hinted at in the opening paragraph.

The kind of collective depression talked about above is in no way unique to my particular community. All over the United States, formerly wealthy (usually industrial) towns have fallen victim to a unique type of motivational deficiency that leaves them bitter and jaded. Lacking constructive occupations, government policies have enabled the population certain luxuries (through certain social welfare programs), while at same time unintentionally breaking their spirit through the constant reminder of their inability to do it on their own. These government handouts, usually in the form of food stamps or other privileges, enable the recipients to spend their discretionary income on certain leisure items. This only masks the disillusionment, in effect forcing a majority of people to be clueless about the source of their depression. So the question remains, if people have access to all the material goods they could ever desire, where does the depression come from? The answer is simple, while far from the material scarcities commonly associated with poverty in developing countries, the shortages seen in modern America is almost purely psychological, but equally as destructive.

In conclusion, this was the community that I grew up in, and where I am forced to return, albeit only occasionally. In an area where bars outnumber viable business, it’s easy to see that that my hometown it rotting from within. Despite this, the people have tried to make the best of things. Their lack of education forces them to gravitate towards interests that I find, boring, ridiculous, or even stupid. In any case, the community’s pursuit for anything to take their minds off the bleak world that they inhabit is something worth praising. Fortunately, the spirit of the region’s inhabitants is not the only advantage to growing up in Northwestern Pennsylvania. After all, its lack of any appealing traits resulted in my desire to leave. As a result, I have attended and graduated from university, traveled around the world, and forged personal and professional relationships. The constant reminder of home drives me to these ends, and any other place could have resulted in the victory of my omnipresent desire to succumb to laziness. If for no other reason, this alone makes my childhood home valuable, and my occasional return only helps reinforce my desire to free myself from the cycle of uncertainty and despair that afflicts a majority of those who remain here.