Things I Tell My Wife, by Matthew Knutson

“Why are you saying goodbye to a street?” I asked Sera. We were walking to my office and it had dawned on my wife that she likely would never walk that route again because we’re moving to another town this weekend.

“I’m the daughter of a missionary,” she explained. “We’re taught to say goodbye to everything, because you never know if you’ll get to see it again.”

This isn’t the first time she said this, and it’s always struck me as fascinating. She’s quite deliberate about saying goodbye. It’s largely due to her not saying goodbye to anything in Kenya when she left to attend college here in Forest City, Iowa. Her parents moved to the states while Sera was studying at Waldorf College, so she never had the chance to say goodbye to her high school home in Nairobi.

Because her father was a medical missionary, they moved around the world very frequently. My wife’s seven-year stint in Forest City actually marks the longest time she’s lived in one city for her entire life. We both know that Forest City will always be a second home to us. It’s the place we met, where we graduated college, where we had our first adult jobs, and where we started our marriage.

In a small town, you are known. Multiple people we didn’t even know congratulated us on our marriage, and people are now hugging us goodbye though they first feel the need to verify we are in fact the couple that they heard is moving. While we’re moving to my state known for being Minnesota-nice, it’s hard to imagine such kind gestures will be occurring ever so frequently in Rochester.

Will our new neighbors bring over Christmas cookies? Will the local coffee shop employees know our names? Will the library waive my wife’s late fee because they know her?

Maybe eventually all of these will come true, but it takes time to invest yourself into a community. Thankfully my new job as communications and events director for United Way of Olmsted County should allow us to connect quite quickly to Rochester and the surrounding area. We definitely plan to bring small-town living with us.

A new chapter begins in Rochester. As a married couple, this move has us stepping forward into a fairly unknown world for the first time together. We’ve cut off the safety net of routine and normalcy, knowing that for a while all we’ll have is each other as we build new friendships and begin new jobs.

Sera has taken up the mantra, “Home is where my husband is.” It’s been easy for my world-traveling wife to think like that, but it’s an unusual concept for me. Sure, it’s romantic, but it’s not something I’ve begun to think too much about or grasp until recently.

Saying goodbye is difficult for most people. Sera would rather say goodbye to everything, and I’d rather slip out the back door and have people wondering where I went an hour after I’ve disappeared. My way is a bit more selfish than hers. People deserve a goodbye, and I suppose places to do.

If I’ve learned anything while working at Waldorf College, it’s that a place is the sum of its people. Every four years, a college becomes a completely different place because it has an entirely new set of students. The soul of a place can live on, but its appearance and personality can change drastically based on who is there. My wife and I look forward to returning to see how the school and town continues to progress in our absence.

So perhaps I’ll say goodbye to the streets, the dorms, my office, the wind turbine and all the other countless things that make Forest City our home. My wife knows a thing or two about moving, and it couldn’t hurt to appreciate some things one last time.

But as Sera and I reflect backwards, we’ll also be looking forward, wondering what our new favorite places will be. Life is filled with so many new things that we’ll have to say goodbye to at some point, and I can’t wait to begin collecting them again. If they’re anything like the treasures we’ve found in Forest City, we’ll surely be unable to count their value.

 

Matthew Knutson is a marketing specialist at Waldorf College in Forest City, Iowa. Find him online at thingsitellmywife.tumblr.com.