No one ever moves away from my town.

Now people leave, sure.

For a weekend or a week, even a month.

But they always come back.

If you're born here, you die here.

I'll call the town Grandview, even though it's not its name.

Fear safety in mind.

It's a small Midwestern city with a few nice parks and a pretty good community college

that everyone goes to.

Flourished through the 21st century while a lot of nearby towns lost people and jobs.

We were even mentioned in the New York Times last year as a rare rust belt success story.

They credited our prosperity to family-owned corporations here choosing not to leave.

But truth is, nobody leaves.

Even young kids know this.

In most places, hearing so and so move to the big city isn't calls for alarm.

In Grandview, it's slang for committing suicide.

There's no ambiguity because nobody moves to any big city.

Even so, most people don't feel trapped here.

I didn't.

It's all recently.

Growing up in Grandview, I assume that I'd stick around like everyone else.

I went to the local college.

...