"The roots are thick here, you know? I tried to leave a few times, but there’s just something about coming back home. When you grow up hearing and living some of these stories, you have a hard time getting away from that. I just didn’t want to leave my history behind like that. I wanted my kids to be able to experience life here. I wanted them to know that not just their grandparents, or their great grandparents, but their great great grandparents lived here. They're the fifth generation to grow up here and that’s so special to me. I wanted them to have that sense of family history and identity. Finally, in 1998 I moved back to Parachute for good. I bought a house and decided that this was it. This is my home and I’m gonna stick around and put down some roots. "
"For a long time I wanted Parachute to stay the cute little town with dirt roads that I had always known it to be. But at some point you come to the realization that you either change or you die, and I was witnessing my town dying. Now, I’ve learned to be excited for all the changes taking place. I want people to come to Parachute and love it as much as I do. I see it for what it was and what it could be. I don’t see it for what it is right now with the vacant lots and the weeds growing up. I talk to people who only see this town at face value right now and they just don’t get it. They wonder how it is that I love this place so much. But I see it for all it could be, and I want nothing more than for that ‘could be’ to come out. I want to create places that people love as much as I do, I want to create things that make people want to come here."
"There’s something about standing next to Parachute Creek and being able to smell the water running over the oil shale and hear the willows rusting along the bank. In the summertime when thunderstorms come rolling through, nothing beats the smell of the rain hitting the hot countryside, cooling everything off. The smell of my mom and grandma canning in the kitchen on sweltering August days… it just smells like home to me. It’s hard to imagine living any other place. Not many people get to hunt in the same places that their ancestors hunted in, and to me, that’s one of the most special connections you can have to a place. I’ve had the opportunity to see some really incredible places around the world, but none of them are home."
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