You can't go home again?

Thomas Wolfe wrote a novel titled, "You Can't Go Home Again." Wolfe was a young writer when he left his hometown to seek his future in other places.

But the memories of his past became parts of books that he wrote as he became more and more famous.

Unfortunately, those in his hometown could see themselves in his books and were unhappy with the way they were portrayed.

When he finally went home to visit, he was shocked by the amount of hostility.

Wolfe and I have at least one thing in common in that we both left home at a young age.

Other things in common? Not so much.

I believe you can go home again -- at least I try to do it every year in October. I look forward to coming back to Southeast Missouri and always feel good afterward on the way back to my current home in South Carolina.

The SEMO region always will be dominant in my memories of growing up. I must have played some kind of ballgame in every town from Perryville to New Madrid. Chaffee raised me, and Cape Girardeau nurtured me.

Memories include Cape's American Legion baseball team and, of course, my years at Southeast Missouri State University. I couldn't drive by Capaha Park without reliving visions of the ballpark and the lake.

Just down Broadway was the Howard-Swan sporting goods store with the barbershop next door, which was the only place in the 1950s where you could get a decent flat-top haircut.

Shivelbine's Music store was only a few blocks farther. All were places I spent a lot of time in my younger years.

I have always been proud of my Southeast Missouri State education. I became a teacher in a family of teachers. Surely no university ever did a better job of getting someone ready to teach our young people. Most university teacher education programs get you ready to teach one subject, two at the most. When I finished at Southeast Missouri State, I had 16 subjects on my teaching certificate I could teach. It had to do with how the leadership organized the curriculum to get maximum benefit.

Each year in early October, Chaffee High School holds its annual reunion.

There you can see 300 people who gather to celebrate their city and its high school.

They sing songs, relive old sports stories, tell tall tales and just feel the joy of being together. The range of ages in the room is from 18 to 80-plus.

The old hometown has changed a lot in the past 50 years. What hasn't changed is that you can still drive down any street and almost everyone you pass will wave at you.

Ah, Chaffee, "City with a Smile." May it always be so. Nothing in life is as constant as change, except for our memories. They are always present in our mind, and we can call them up any time we want.