Jan 26 2007
Where Are You From?
Where are you from? It’s a complicated question. Jobs, family and education can pull a person in a thousand different directions.
New technology doesn’t help much. The internet allows for communication across vast distances. A person can keep in touch with friends or follow a favorite sports team from a thousand miles away.
So, place isn’t important, right?
Well, I suppose that’s why I’m writing this blog. My name is Michael Ingels and place is still important to me. I am a Monroe native. My great-great-great grandparents built the log cabin that stands at the Monroe County Fairgrounds. My cousins run the Auto Body Plant near the Independent Dairy. And I practically grew up in the choir loft at St. Michael’s Church on Front Street.
I loved Monroe, but life happened. College pulled me to Ann Arbor and graduation hurled me to the outskirts of Chicago. Love and marriage carried me to Appleton, WI and teaching landed me back in Michigan in a little town called Addison. Along the way I’ve lived in a string of southern Michigan communities, like Tecumseh, Onsted and Manchester. My wife and I just bought a house in Adrian.
Every one of those places can lay some claim to the title of “home.”
But a funny thing happens when someone asks me that opening question. My answer is still “Monroe.” It’s the place that I know best. And, even after ten years away, it’s a place that I still love.
So, I’ll end with this question for you. Where are you from? And how did you get where you are today?
Wow … how much space do you have?
Born and raised in Flint with a couple years in Columbus for college, marriage took me to Westland, and then the Navy took me to Chicago, Memphis, Virginia, then to Maryland where Teen Tech blogger Aaron was born on a Navy base. After a final tour out of Virginia where two more kids were born, Toyota brought me back to Michigan, where I’ve since lived in Tecumseh (my fourth was born in Ann Arbor), the Flint area, and now very happily in Luna Pier.
BTW (yes, I’m following your lead about commenting on comments without intermediate comments …
), in an email a few weeks ago you had asked how Mary and I met. I’ve found this morning the Wedding Webpage we’d put together on TheKnot.com is still there! It has the whole story:
http://weddings.theknot.com/pwp/view/co_main.aspx?coupleid=3227151796114687&MsdVisit=1
Dave!
That’s amazing. My wife Kathy and I were married on the very same day - June 25, 2005. Of course, we were about 700 miles away in Appleton, WI. Maybe we can help remind each other when the anniversary is coming up:)
BTW, Kathy and I met on the internet as well. We met on a site called catholicsingles.com. I’d never tried anything like that before. But within about three weeks, we had chatted, met and started this crazy little plan we’ve been on ever since.
Love at first click? Maybe. But it sure takes a lot of work. I’m sure that I’ll throw a blog about it up at some point.
Mike, Dave. This meeting on the internet thing has me fascinated. Just a few months after his wife of 30 years died, my brother met his second wife on the internet - I thought it was incredible. But I keep running into more and more people who owe their marital bliss to the internet.
How many more Monroe County couples are out there who met on the internet? Should we consider a singles meeting spot on our Web site?
Hi Dan!
It’s really funny. Kathy and I are just about the most traditional kind of people you could meet.
And, at first, I thought that everyone would think that I was ABSOLUTELY CRAZY to marry someone I met on the computer. I thought that this was especially true considering that we were about 500 to 700 miles away from each other and we had to commute every other weekend for two years. We spent lots of time in airplanes, on trains, in cars and on boats.
But, we both had the same unique things in common. We both grew up near nuke plants. We both came from very Catholic families in very Catholic communities. We are both teachers. And we were both born within about two weeks of each other in 1975.
I would never have met her without the focus that an internet web page provides. I think that it quickly eliminates a lot of people that a person is not compatible with. So, you get a lot of dating out of the way in a short period of time. I know this doesn’t sound romantic, but the internet is very efficient.
I think that the best internet dating spots are those that appeal to a niche. I think that it might be a great idea, but you really have to think it through. Would you have “Men finding Men” in Monroe? Would it end up being a distasteful kind of meat market? You wouldn’t want it to end up on Dateline:NBC. The devil is in the details:)
BTW, my sister - who works downtown - met her husband online. My brother, who works for Microsoft, is still single. Go figure.
Dan, even with all the success stories out there, too many times an internet “prince” will turn out to be less than a frog. Many online sites are now having to implement some kind of protective technologies to help catch possible problems, while actually being unable to catch them all. My thoughts are that you really don’t want the aggravation or the possibilty of that kind of liability.