My wife had the opportunity, a dozen or so years ago, to experience an opportunity as a staff writer for the Cartersville Herald, a daily newspaper in a small town about 45 minutes northwest of Atlanta, just off I-75.

She had been a local reporter for a number of years in the Bryan-Liberty area for two different publications, and had won numerous awards from the Georgia Press Association for her reporting on local news, government and public safety. But because the publications she worked for had not been “daily” ones, the next paper she applied to would not hire her, citing that lack.

So she looked around for daily paper openings, found and got the one with the Cartersville paper. What a nice bunch of people!

Cartersville is, surprisingly, a “railroad town.” That is, it is a railroad crossroads, with a large number of trains coming through every day. Very different from Savannah. We did not know that.

She happened to find a duplex for rent, reasonably priced, on the west side of town, where she stayed for the first six months. The only drawback was a train track ran just behind her building. So she was constantly hearing trains coming through at night when she got in from her day’s work. Surprisingly, she eventually adjusted to it, so that the rumblings did not affect her at all. I had a similar experience, my freshman year in college, at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville, my mother’s hometown. Freshman were not allowed to have cars on campus, and were housed in a collection of dorms on the west side of campus. So we had no traffic noise there.

In Savannah, I grew up in a house on a very busy corner in what is now “southside,” and it was always noisy: cars coming and going, ambulances and fire trucks, heading to the nearby hospital and adjacent firehouse, etc. It took me two months or so to acclimate to the absolute quiet of the freshman dorm complex at UVA that fall – and an equal amount of time to re-acclimate myself, once I got back home the following summer! I was quite surprised.

I never knew that “ambient noise” would make such a big difference, before. It all depends what one is used to.

Cartersville was notable for a couple of things. One was the Tellus Science Museum, just north of town, off I-75; the other was the Booth Western Art Museum, at the next intersection. Both very worthwhile for visits!

We did not get to see either one of them during her stay in Cartersville, but we did, later on, and were glad we did. Both are “hidden jewels,” being outside Atlanta proper, but well worth visiting.

The Booth Museum of Western Art was a much larger facility than I expected it to be; and included a much wider variety of art than I knew was possible. But then, sometimes I’m just very ignorant about certain subjects. This was one of them.

Our trip to both museums did what museum visits are supposed to do: They exposed our minds to a variety of concepts and experiences that we did not know existed; and gave us a much broader perspective on the topics presented. I am very glad we went.

This was an experience born of a job change that, while short-lived, nonetheless gave us both a new perspective on a part of our state that was outside our range of prior experiences. Even though it did not lead to the permanent relocation we were at first hoping for, it still gave us a much broader appreciation for what came after.

I am glad we were open to trying that experience, and very grateful to the folks we met along the way, who were both kind and helpful to us, as we tried to find our way through that thicket. Things did not turn out as we initially hoped, but we eventually saw that it led us to where we were ultimately supposed to go.

Such is Life! Full of twists and turns, and unexpected surprises.