The town you grew up in defines your character — don’t try to tell me it doesn’t. The school you went to determines your friends for countless years. The secret places in the town only you and your friends knew about will stay with you forever.

Owasso – a small town that’s usually only known about if you mention Tulsa. Home of the Rams (used to be Owls, but Rams fits it much better). On Friday nights, all you’ll hear is the band playing before a football game, signaling the start of yet another season that could possibly lead to the playoffs. 129th would be jam-packed with cars trying to park, and people who weren’t planning on attending the games would, at all costs, avoid that street. After a win, or even a loss, you’d find most of the fans at Whataburger (since we finally got one!) or some small party at a football player’s house that their parents didn’t know they were throwing. Saturdays were filled with band contests, or driving to Tulsa because walking around Target and PetSmart weren’t cutting it anymore.

Driving into Owasso was definitely an experience. The “gateway to Owasso,” otherwise known as the bridges over Bird Creek, was the entrance to a town that everyone claimed to hate but never left. I think that happens with every small town, though. You know faces walking around school, but yet you couldn’t get their name right to save your life. If you were consistent going to church, people would know your name after a few weeks. You’ll run into someone you know everywhere you go, even if it's Old Navy early one Saturday morning. You’ll still see a familiar face.

Owasso was the place where I met friends that would remain in my life till college, and some friends who were just around for the times we needed each other. Either way, the people of Owasso definitely influence one another. We’re a weird type of breed, us Owassoins. We live in a town that’s considered small compared to Tulsa, but big compared to Collinsville. (And we’re definitely growing and expanding fast.) We have a lot of places to go, but we still drive out of town to go to the AMC or Woodland Hills. We’re not the most sheltered bunch of kids growing up, but we’re still not faced with the “bad part of town” or bad things happening in the schools.

Owasso means “end of the trail,” which means for us high schoolers that graduated and went to college out of town, that it was the end of that time in our life, and that we were ready to start a new one. For some, it meant the end of searching for a town to love, and to stop and raise a family here. Whichever way you look at the meaning of the town, there’s one thing important to remember: whether you leave Owasso for another town, or even state, it’s always a home that welcomes everyone with open arms.