You Gave Me Ohio
And It's Ours Now Forever
I knew I’d move here. When I left for Colorado, I understood it was temporary. You had one more year left at school, and there was no question you’d be moving home to Ohio after graduation, which meant I was moving to Ohio.
It wasn’t that you hated Colorado; it just wasn’t near your people. It wasn’t near mine either. I’ve never had my family all in one place, so I’ve never felt drawn to one specific city or state. But I felt drawn here because I felt drawn to you.
Over ten years ago, we spoke on FaceTime and your mom told me the difference between buckeyes and buckeyes. One is a nut, the others are chocolate-covered peanut butter balls. There are people who know where we’re going before we do.
I’ve since sat in front of many proverbial chalkboards getting schooled on what it means to call Ohio home. My first lesson taught me it’s THE Ohio State Buckeyes, we don’t root against THE Ohio State Buckeyes, and under no circumstances do we root for That Team Up North.
Matter of fact, we don’t give a damn for the whole state—although we did spend a few days there after our wedding, and I did have to drive three hours to Detroit to renew that passport you couldn’t believe I let expire. But across the lake, one of five we would never consider great, a city dared to believe and so did we.
With his body engulfed in tattoos, J.R. Smith strolled through the streets of Believe Land in 2016, red and yellow confetti underneath his feet, creating a new kind of red carpet. “Cleveland! This is for you,” LeBron James, a kid from Akron, yelled after leading the Cavaliers to a championship.
And I know they felt it in Toledo and Dayton and Cincinnati (even though I’ve learned that’s pretty much Kentucky) and Canton and Athens. And I know without a doubt you felt it in Columbus.
“We are all witnesses,” read the mural with LeBron’s arms stretched wide as if to gather all of Ohio into his kingdom. The city took that mural down when LeBron left. That was the summer I moved to Ohio.
And I now see, whenever I leave Ohio, I’m already ready to come back. You predict LeBron will, and we all hope you’re right. If somehow Bronny doesn’t join his dad in the league this summer and we must settle for him in the scarlet and gray, let it be. It’s because of you that I even care whether he calls Ohio home.
On my walk around the park in the city we now call home, that you’ve called home all your life, some other kids from Akron caught my attention. Well, they’re not kids anymore. Neither are we. But the Black Keys have a new album called Ohio Players.
I’ve never listened to a Black Keys album before, and I’ve certainly never been to Akron. But I did just learn that a homie's dad worked on Brothers. And even if I didn’t know that, the mere mention of Ohio in the title would make me pause the world for a taste of acknowledgement.
To know against all odds—Ohio against the world—that our place of living is worthy of recognition is a reminder that I wouldn’t care if it was said if it weren’t for you.
Toni Morrison, a notable Ohioan, which I now feel compelled to clarify, writes Ohio on the page. In her great American novel Beloved, Morrison writes, “In Ohio seasons are theatrical. Each one enters like a prima donna, convinced its performance is the reason the world has people in it.”
These sentences mean something to me because of you. I know of the seasons’ disposition toward drama because together we share its scenes. I remember the trees that line the street outside our first apartment and how they adorned themselves in breathtaking shades of red, yellow and orange.
Even last week, Ohio teased a long-lasting spring with its first total solar eclipse in 218 years. Hundreds gathered in the park where we sometimes walk and where I would return after the spectacle to play basketball. They will eventually shut down the court for the festival where I’ve volunteered with you since before I moved here.
We all looked up and applauded in the darkness. And even though you weren’t there with me, you’re always there with me because you gave me this. You’re the reason Ohio has me in it.
The sun and moon hung above us like a mural, all of us witnesses to a sky we look at together in this place we call home. The same sky that, to put it in Jamee Mae Kyson’s words, has attended a thousand births of who we’re becoming. And I believe we’ll join the sky in seeing thousands more.
Ten years down, many more to go. And I say thank you for giving me Ohio, which is to say: Elizabeth, thank you for giving me you.
Suddenly really want to go to Ohio… forever????
This is incredibly heartwarming. To have a man write about me in this way would knock me unconscious