N is for (drum roll please)...

 Some of these alphabet posts make me think hard about the topic that best fits the letter.

Not this one.

N, my fiends, is for NEW JERSEY!

And yes, I am yelling it -- loudly and proudly.

I'm a Jersey girl through and through. I've officially lived in Pennsylvania for more than twice as long as I inhabited my home state but, in my heart, I am most assuredly not a Pennsylvanian. I married one, I'm a mother to one (much to my dismay, she cannot claim NJ as home) and I have amazing friends who are Pennsylvanians.

But not me.

I'm not Jersey like The Sopranos or Jersey Shore. I was a grew-up-in-the-suburbs, walk to school, sergeant-on-the-safety-patrol-making-sure-the-little-kids-got-across-the-street kinda kid. As a teen, I shopped at the mall, rode my bike around town and went down the shore right after prom. I'm lunch meat, not cold cuts, soda, not pop, and hoagies not subs, though I've never been much of a fan of that last one. I like panzarottis and bakery cream donuts and went the first third of my life not knowing what a red beet egg or hog maw was. (I still don't eat either of them).

I don't dislike Pennsylvania. I've been a homeowner here for nearly three decades, worked in three different school districts (six if you count my internships in grad school) here, and raised a child here. I've also met some of the best people I'll ever know here.  

It's just not home in the same way New Jersey is.

I always thought I'd move back to New Jersey after college, and I almost did. But the job offer in Pennsylvania came several weeks ahead of the interview in Jersey, and so I stayed in the state where I earned my degree. 

Little did I know that would be a permanent decision.

I guess nothing is permanent, at least not on its own. 

Except maybe my Jersey affiliation.