“Paint me a Birmingham, Make it look just they way I planned….”
So there’s this song called a paint me a Birmingham. Like Birmingham, Alabama. I know. I know. You’ve probably never heard it if you don’t listen to country and it wasn’t widely popular. That I can remember. The song. Not the artist. But anyways not the point. Why they wrote a song on Birmingham is beyond me. If you’ve ever been here well there’s not really much going on. Atlanta took the cool points for the south and Nashville has the music.
Alabama however is pretty much only known for like one thing. It is however an important thing but that’s about all its got going for it. Football. We have one of the most deeply rooted team rivalries in the nation. It’s pretty much understood that you have to pick a side. Side swapping isn’t allowed except in extreme cases. You’re born into it usually. Whole families claim a team. You must be Alabama or Auburn. No matter where you go in the state there will be someone who is for either. They’ll have a t-shirt on. A decal on their car. A car tag. Or even greet you with a Roll Tide.
But that’s about it. All we’ve pretty much got going for us is football. Oh and the sugar white sands along the coastline but all the way up here in Birmingham. Well there’s a whole lot of nothing going on. Most people live and die here. They go on the occasional vacation to the beach or the mountains. Perhaps even international if you come from the rich side of town. But mostly people go to school, get married, have a couple of babies and that’s it. Church on Sundays, work Monday through Friday, and the lake on Saturday. Of course don’t get me wrong God needs people who are happy right where they’re planted. He needs those ladies that religiously come to church every Sunday to love on those babies in Sunday School. To teach how to go out into the world and show people Jesus. I wouldn’t be sitting here writing this if there weren’t those kind of people. Completely happy with where they were planted, blooming away, and loving on all the babies regardless if they actually belonged to them or not.
But the guy in the song was unhappy with the way his “Birmingham” was turning out. It wasn’t going the way he planned it. The quiet life. No matter the city…Most people’s “Birmingham” looks a lot like the actual Birmingham. You go to school, go to college, get a job, get married, buy a house, settle down, have some kids, and live a “normal” life. Not much difference in how it goes no matter where you live. Normal life. Nothing to crazy.
Then there’s me. (and a couple other thousand according to the world race website). People who don’t just want to accept that this is all there is to life. People who get restless at the thought of owning a house in one spot. Committing to one geographically location. Building a life there. Friends and family just down the road and the church right around the corner in a brick building. People who get restless if there isn’t a road trip every so often just for a change of scenery. People who want to see the world and be the change instead of hoping someone else will do it. People who will step up to the plate and say yes I will be a little uncomfortable so that maybe someone else can finally have clean water. People that were born with wings instead of roots. (there are 2 kinds of people the ones with roots that were born to stay and be happy with where they are. Then there are the people with wings. They were made to travel the globe or the country never quite picking one spot for too long)
Now with that being established that I have wings and I need to travel to be happy. My scenery needs to change or I get restless. People still call me crazy for doing this. I have actually be called crazy on multiple occasions to my face. Or I get that really weird look when I say that I’ll be gone for almost an entire year. The most common question I get is are you crazy? The answer is different depending on who you ask. If you ask most of my family and friends the answer would be yes. If you ask me of course not but maybe.
Packing up everything that I can take with me in a 65 liter pack and 32 liter back pack might be a little crazy. Eating on a $5 a day food budget might get a little dicey. Planning on only taking around $1500 with you to last the whole year might be just a tad on the nuts side. But my Birmingham doesn’t look like yours. My perfect picture never included a house with a picket white fence, a minivan, a really cute husband, and 2.5 kids. (maybe the husband haha) My hometown will always be a dot on the state road map 20 minutes outside the city of Birmingham in the suburbs. I will always answer where are you from with Birmingham to anyone who doesn’t live here because Pinson gets you that huh? look. But my perfect picture will always be a globe. Never meeting a stranger anywhere I’m at.
So maybe I am crazy but I want crazy. I want to feel, see, and taste the world. I don’t want to be like everyone else. I don’t want to settle down. I want to spread my wings and fly. Then one day I’ll come back to this little place and know that this is where it all began. This is where I was born. This is where I was raised. This is where my hometown is. But for now my Birmingham will be everywhere and anywhere in between.
If you want to listen to the song….
