Bob the fireman is gone, along with America’s sense of community
Menckens GhostThomas Wolfe said you can’t go home again. He was right. My hometown has become like the rest of America: supersized, superficial, spendaholic, subsidized, socialized, statist, silly, and segregated by class.
There was then also no class difference between urban and rural--and virtually no suburbia. Mom and dad knew all the kids I played with and all of their parents and where they lived. Not only is there no hometown and no neighborhood, there are few homes with intact families. In other words, few homes.