URBANNA — While walking down Virginia Street the other day it occurred to me that many changes had come about in the 40 years since we had moved here from Newport News. I hardly recognized the town I first knew.
As I observed the present day Urbanna, I recalled the way it had been when we first bought a cottage on the river on Kent Street and slowly made the move from the city. I felt the passing time as if it were a sudden wind sprung up off the Rappahannock River blowing through my hair — 40 years, over half of my life, spent in this beloved town, which was to replace my hometown in Ohio, that I now call home.
I was left with two very strong realizations. Life was made up of a combination of constant change and the rapid passing of time. Yet I still saw all the citizens of yesteryear, those who once lived in Urbanna and carried out their businesses and lives within this same tiny plot of land, their coming and going across the stage as if actors playing many parts, making entrances and all too quick exits — an unending play moving across time as if a film played on high speed, and as if there were no end.
