Living in the Country

[randomusername]

My small town relatives often shop at the Costco 90+ minutes away when they can. Their town has a population in low/mid four digits. The bigger town (actually two towns that run into each other) has a population in low five digits–it makes a considerable difference which you live in. The smaller town has one grocery store that really squeezes residents on produce that isn’t that great (hence the Costco runs).

You have to go 90 minutes away for anything beyond a pair of shoes or jeans. Men can buy blue collar work clothes in town and I expect there is adequate children’s clothing available, but white collar men and women generally will need to look further.

Also, as I recall from a recent trip, it is impossible to buy so much as a Pack N Play closer than 90 minutes away. Fortunately, there is such a thing as Amazon, but you can’t get anything immediately.

Genuine high fashion is probably three hours away.

Woah towns in America are so much different. Here are town in the thousands would have like 4 large supermarkets(I’m basing this off two towns on either side of me that I live in 15 mins of and tons of small shops. They’d have tons of facilities and be considered big towns. There are be lots of game shops, a big cinema and a shopping centre full of clothes stores(high fashion and cheap ones) and all that in a town of a few thousand here.

How do thousands of Americans in those towns survive with only ONE grocery store? And having to travel ages to get clothes or anything like that when you live in a town of a few thousand sounds absolutely absurd to me.

 

[Xantippe]

Woah towns in America are so much different. Here are town in the thousands would have like 4 large supermarkets(I’m basing this off two towns on either side of me that I live in 15 mins of and tons of small shops. They’d have tons of facilities and be considered big towns. There are be lots of game shops, a big cinema and a shopping centre full of clothes stores(high fashion and cheap ones) and all that in a town of a few thousand here.

How do thousands of Americans in those towns survive with only ONE grocery store? And having to travel ages to get clothes or anything like that when you live in a town of a few thousand sounds absolutely absurd to me.

Our density is just really low in much of the US.

And that’s why a lot of people here are so crazy about their cars and having them be huge and comfy–they practically live in them.

Bear in mind that our “large supermarket” is probably way, way bigger than your “large supermarket.” So my home town’s one grocery store also sells clothes, hunting and fishing equipment, hardware for do-it-yourself projects, has a bakery, an espresso place, and (if I’m remembering correctly), they also sell electronics.

I live in a bigger city (200,000ish), but our big new grocery store has an electronics store, a bakery, a clothing section, a separate section devoted to the local college sports team (t-shirts, scarves, garden gnomes, etc.), a rotisserie/sandwich place where they are continually roasting dozens of chickens, a pharmacy, a bank, and probably some other stuff I"m forgetting. It’s almost like the big store in Idiocracy.

It’s kind of crazy!

 

[Ridgerunner]

Woah towns in America are so much different. Here are town in the thousands would have like 4 large supermarkets(I’m basing this off two towns on either side of me that I live in 15 mins of and tons of small shops. They’d have tons of facilities and be considered big towns. There are be lots of game shops, a big cinema and a shopping centre full of clothes stores(high fashion and cheap ones) and all that in a town of a few thousand here.

How do thousands of Americans in those towns survive with only ONE grocery store? And having to travel ages to get clothes or anything like that when you live in a town of a few thousand sounds absolutely absurd to me.

One has to realize that the population density in Ireland is about double that of the U.S., including in my state. That makes a difference.

However, one can add that just about any town of 2500 or more is going to have at least a Walmart, which contains a supermarket itself. Usually there is also a competitor.

A lot of this depends on what one wants to buy. I live in a more populated “strip” of the Ozarks than in the rest of region. It’s about 50 miles wide by 100 miles long and has about a million inhabitants. In this “strip”, if one wants to buy a $200 mens’ suit, he will probably find one no farther than 15 or 20 miles away if he lives between towns. If he wants a $1500 suit, then he might be as far as 45 miles away. If he wants a $5000+ suit, he’s at least two hours away. (I would never lay out $5,000 for a suit, so I might have missed seeing some closer to hand) To buy a new Chevrolet or a Cadillac, one would never have to go more than 20 miles. One might have to travel 40-50 miles to buy a brand new BMW. To buy a new Ferrari, one is two and a half hours away.

But if one wants to buy country property, most can actually afford it. Housing is inexpensive. Food is inexpensive. Utilities are inexpensive. Employment is plentiful. There are three very large lakes in the “strip” and, of course, Branson, Mo. where there is big name entertainment. (I realize people in Ireland wouldn’t likely know about Branson, but a lot of people in the U.S. do)

It depends on what a person wants, and where, exactly, in the “country” he wants to locate.

And, of course, gasoline costs more than twice as much in Ireland as it does in the U.S., so people in rural areas aren’t quite as burdened by the cost of travel here as they are there.

Interestingly, where the rural population is lower and the towns farther apart, there tend to be more shops. So, a town of, say, 5,000 in my particular area where much larger towns are near to hand, will have fewer shops than a town of the same size in, say, south-central Missouri where the towns are much fewer and large ones are two hours away in any direction.

Demand generates the supply. People will go so far to shop for particular things, but no farther, and the more upscale the product desired, the more likely one will have to travel in order to get it.

And demand matters. Where I live, the saying goes: “The way you can tell a millionaire from a factory worker is that the factory worker’s pickup is newer, but the rifle in the millionaire’s gun rack is a lot better.” There are, for example, plenty of people in Springfield, Mo who could buy a Lamborghini. But most people who could afford one would not want to be seen with one in his driveway. Some things spell “ostentation” here that might not elsewhere.

 

[Ridgerunner]

Living on the edge of a small village is one thing, but living in the country means that you’ll do tons of driving, your kids won’t get much chance to socialise unless you drive them in and out of town all day long and shops, schools, clinics, hospitals are all annoying drives away. I’d say live on the edge of a small village surrounded by the country and you’ll have plenty of space and you won’t have to do so much driving because you could just walk to the local shop very quickly.

But it all depends on what job you have.

There is no part of area in which I live where the school buses do not run. I doubt there’s any place in the state where they don’t. Socializing is more difficult if one lives a long way from a town, but then, there are both positives and negatives to that, particularly for kids.

One thing about living near a small town is that a lot of small towns, at least in my area, sort of “ooze” out into the countryside. So a town of, nominally, 5,000 might actually have double that number if one counts the small tracts within five miles outside the city limits. And, not surprisingly, the closer one is to a town, the more expensive the land is. One might have to pay $10,000/acre for a small tract within 10 minutes of Springfield. If one is 40 miles or more from Springfield and at least ten miles from a small town, it would be more like $1500-$2000, depending on what kind of land it is and the prosperity of the town. If one is also deep in the really steep hill country, it might be as little as $800.

But you know, my brother in Kansas City traveled 45 minutes to work every day for years, all within the city. (unless there was an accident on the highway, then it took longer) Soooooo

 

[Bonnie]

However, one can add that just about any town of 2500 or more is going to have at least a Walmart, which contains a supermarket itself. Usually there is also a competitor.

Our nearest town is the county seat, pop. about 5,000. It has a WalMart with a grocery store, 2 regular grocery stores, community college, excellent library, 2 movie theaters (one a drive-in), several parks, lots of excellent community organizations such as theater, music, dance, hospital & medical clinic, community (low cost) dental clinic, and several homeschool organizations.

We are looking at property near a town about half that size, but we are retired and the kids are grown. The only things we need are a decent hospital nearby, a grocery store (but we’ve been told that many people drive to the town we’re in now to do their grocery shopping), a hardware store, feed store, vet, and a farrier.

 

[Sunbreak]

I lived on an island with a small population for 5 years. It was nice to know the people around you - to be familiar with the person who is the cashier, the bank teller, etc. Of course, everyone knows everyone else’s business. It was nice to take a hike when I wanted to and be surrounded by nature. It was nice to participate in local live theater, which is something I probably wouldn’t have tried to do in a large city. However, you can’t “eat” the scenery and decent jobs were hard to come by, so many people had to cobble several part time jobs together. That also meant you didn’t have the same kind of job protections or perks that you would have in the city. As people got older, they had to move away to have access to medical care or be flown off the island in an emergency. Groceries, gas and electricity were higher priced than in the city. Many other things like clothes were either not available locally or really only geared to the tourist trade. Although there were some activities on the island, mostly you had to make your own fun. There was also cabin fever and most people felt they had to get off the island at least every few months for a trip to the mainland. Also, it was not immune to crime - there were thefts, drug activity and people coming to the island to “hide out”.
For someone who is interested in looking into rural living, I would recommend doing it on a “try and see basis” first. It really can be a culture shock. Also consider you are thrown together in a small community with all sorts of people who may not have your same values and beliefs. Disagreements have more of an impact in a small community than in a big city, so you are not just reading about something in the paper - you know the people involved and may have to interact with them frequently. Things you take for granted may not even be available like cell phone coverage or internet access.

 

[BlueEyedLady]

I in the country about 12 miles away from the nearest town (pop 4,500). I graduated high school in that town.

Although there are a few benefits of living in a small town, there are lots of downsides.

The nearest Wal-Mart was 30 minutes away. The only places to shop in my hometown were the grocery store (very small, certainly no espresso bar), and the dollar store. Jobs were very low paying and there weren’t enough of them. Living in a rural area, you usually don’t have a choice about your child’s school-so if it’s bad, it’s bad. Many rural communities and small towns are plagued with methamphetamine, meth labs, and the crimes that result from the drug trade. It’s cliche, but it’s true-everyone knows your business. There is no anonymity in a small town.

But my biggest problem with rural areas is that there is often a culture of poverty. Children are often discouraged from higher education or even moving out and into a city. People are can be very fearful of new people, cultures, and ideas. Growing up, my mom and brother both made it very clear to me that I was going to college. But when I would tell people that as a kid, they would tell me “you have big ideas”. People were eager to tell you that you were a snob who thought you were better than everyone else if you were a senior in high school who had a college acceptance letter. Teen pregnancy and unwed pregnancy in general are more the norm in my small town than they are in any city I’ve ever lived in. It’s not that they are bad people, but but being poor, uneducated, and working for minimum wage or just above it for decades is a way of life for a lot of people, and it’s one that they are proud of-and that’s sad. I looked up the stats a few years ago and just shy of 60% of the kids in my district were on the free/reduced lunch program. No one bats and eye because everyone is poor, no one is making it on their own, and it’s so normalized.

If you choose to move your family to an area like that, you need to be aware of the culture. This is a message that your kids may even get from their own teachers in school!

Sorry for the rant. I was actually just talking with my best friend a few days ago about how sad it is that so many kind and intelligent people that I went to high school with never did anything with their lives. It really irks me.

 

[1ke]

However, one can add that just about any town of 2500 or more is going to have at least a Walmart, which contains a supermarket itself. Usually there is also a competitor.

This is not my experience. In many rural communities, Walmart is built in the county seat. Other towns, even sizable ones, that aren’t the county seat don’t get a Walmart. That’s how it is where I live.

A lot of this depends on what one wants to buy. I live in a more populated “strip” of the Ozarks than in the rest of region. It’s about 50 miles wide by 100 miles long and has about a million inhabitants.

You are not in a rural area, comparatively speaking. There are only 17,000 people in our entire county.

 

[1ke]

I in the country about 12 miles away from the nearest town (pop 4,500). I graduated high school in that town.

Although there are a few benefits of living in a small town, there are lots of downsides.

The nearest Wal-Mart was 30 minutes away. The only places to shop in my hometown were the grocery store (very small, certainly no espresso bar), and the dollar store. Jobs were very low paying and there weren’t enough of them. Living in a rural area, you usually don’t have a choice about your child’s school-so if it’s bad, it’s bad. Many rural communities and small towns are plagued with methamphetamine, meth labs, and the crimes that result from the drug trade. It’s cliche, but it’s true-everyone knows your business. There is no anonymity in a small town.

But my biggest problem with rural areas is that there is often a culture of poverty. Children are often discouraged from higher education or even moving out and into a city. People are can be very fearful of new people, cultures, and ideas. Growing up, my mom and brother both made it very clear to me that I was going to college. But when I would tell people that as a kid, they would tell me “you have big ideas”. People were eager to tell you that you were a snob who thought you were better than everyone else if you were a senior in high school who had a college acceptance letter. Teen pregnancy and unwed pregnancy in general are more the norm in my small town than they are in any city I’ve ever lived in. It’s not that they are bad people, but but being poor, uneducated, and working for minimum wage or just above it for decades is a way of life for a lot of people, and it’s one that they are proud of-and that’s sad. I looked up the stats a few years ago and just shy of 60% of the kids in my district were on the free/reduced lunch program. No one bats and eye because everyone is poor, no one is making it on their own, and it’s so normalized.

If you choose to move your family to an area like that, you need to be aware of the culture. This is a message that your kids may even get from their own teachers in school!

Sorry for the rant. I was actually just talking with my best friend a few days ago about how sad it is that so many kind and intelligent people that I went to high school with never did anything with their lives. It really irks me.

Yep. Yep. Yep.

The only difference around here is not very many teen pregnancies and there is a better mix of kids that do/don’t go to college. And a lot of them that don’t go to 4 year do go to the 2 year tech college.

 

[Xantippe]

If you choose to move your family to an area like that, you need to be aware of the culture. This is a message that your kids may even get from their own teachers in school!

Yeah–that was one of the last straws for my sister.

When my nephew was in elementary school in our home town, he was reading Harry Potter during reading time, and the teacher was telling him that he wasn’t really reading such a big book. !!!

The only way that would be an acceptable thing to say was if it was friendly teasing, but even then, I think it’s unwise to even joke like that with little kids, because they often can’t tell the difference between serious and a joke.

 

[PolarGuy]

All great posts by many good posters (including some I often disagree elsewhere with).

I too have some experience living in a very rural area and I would never do it again (maybe a second home in the middle of nowhere if I win the powerball, but not before).

I would however underscore a few points:

1. In rural areas everyone knows your business. I knew a minister and his wife; she said to me, “when I light a cigarette the whole town knows in 10 minutes.”
2. There are few jobs. IMHO it’s more complex than “a doctor or lawyer can do OK,” because professionals go where clients are. “There’s a saying: 1 lawyer in a small town will go broke, but 2 will do fine” (because with 2, they can sue each other’s clients!" Most small industries have left rural areas.
3. There are also markedly less opportunities for certain types of people/professionals. For example, if you work in finance/banking, 70% of all money entering the US goes through Boston or New York so those jobs are centered there. You can be a bank teller at some rural bank, but there are just a lot less jobs there.
4. This is a bad example, but I always remember an episode of MASH where Frank Burns says “all the good doctors are in Beverly Hills helping the wealthy.” Although that’s not true, there is some merit to it vis-à-vis things like quality of medical care (in addition to quantity). For example, if I have cancer or any serious medical issue, I will absolutely get better treatment at a big-city teaching hospital than I will at some tiny rural hospital – almost no exceptions.
5. It is very hard to be single in a rural area.
6. I admit I am jaded, but in the rural area I lived in any young person with any ambition moved away – they all saw how limited life was in rural areas, i.e., the posts others raised. Who was left were people who were largely content to work their service- related or government jobs; fish; drink a few beers on the weekends, etc., and generally kind of “while away the years.” I am not condemning that, but I found it to be a harsh reality. Entrepreneurs; risk-takers; people who wanted to “see what the County had to offer,” etc., had no desire to stay, because there was little to keep them there.
7. I live in an area where, within 50 miles, there are several major-league sports teams; orchestras; maybe 2-3 dozen universities; probably 20-30 good quality hospitals including cancer centers; museums, and untold cultural opportunities.
8. I saved the best for last: want Indian food tonight? Thai? Sushi? Food trucks? How about 1 5-star dining establishment for anniversaries? They don’t generally exist in rural areas (not for long anyway).

 

[Xantippe]

1. This is a bad example, but I always remember an episode of MASH where Frank Burns says “all the good doctors are in Beverly Hills helping the wealthy.” Although that’s not true, there is some merit to it vis-à-vis things like quality of medical care (in addition to quantity). For example, if I have cancer or any serious medical issue, I will absolutely get better treatment at a big-city teaching hospital than I will at some tiny rural hospital – almost no exceptions.

**From family anecdotes, my impression is that my hometown one-horse hospital is OK for stuff like chainsaw injuries (a local favorite), but bad for a lot of other stuff. I just heard a wince-inducing story from a relative about how one of the local doctors has been responsible for at least three different botched circumcisions. He’s still practicing there. You know the joke about what do you call the worst graduate from the worst medical school in the country? Well, a couple of them seem to practice in my home town.
**

1. I admit I am jaded, but in the rural area I lived in any young person with any ambition moved away – they all saw how limited life was in rural areas, i.e., the posts others raised. Who was left were people who were largely content to work their service- related or government jobs; fish; drink a few beers on the weekends, etc., and generally kind of “while away the years.” I am not condemning that, but I found it to be a harsh reality. Entrepreneurs; risk-takers; people who wanted to “see what the County had to offer,” etc., had no desire to stay, because there was little to keep them there.

I have a go-getter relative still in our home town, but the family bounces back and forth between their suburban location and their rural location–she and her family run tourist businesses near our home town during the summer. None of the rest of my generation is around.

1. I saved the best for last: want Indian food tonight? Thai? Sushi? Food trucks? How about 1 5-star dining establishment for anniversaries? They don’t generally exist in rural areas (not for long anyway).

You’ll probably do a little better in an area with a strong tourist trade.

 

[PolarGuy]

Xan, the rural area I lived actually had a decent tourist trade. Problem is, tourism is often not a 4 season industry. In my experience, rural tourism is usually limited to skiing in the winter or summer sports and little in between.

 

[Xantippe]

Here’s a biggie:

The parish situation can often be dismal.

You get a pastor who is in charge of your parish plus a parish 20 miles away plus a prison or two. He’s spread pretty thin and he’s also the only Catholic priest within 60 miles. If he’s less than inspiring (which happens) and if he is there a number of years, it can be pretty grim. I know some people frown on parish-shopping or parish-hopping, but in a larger city with multiple parishes, some relief can be found. In a small town, there’s only going to be one Catholic parish. In fact, even in a smallish city, there may be only one parish.

 

[Xantippe]

Xan, the rural area I lived actually had a decent tourist trade. Problem is, tourism is often not a 4 season industry. In my experience, rural tourism is usually limited to skiing in the winter or summer sports and little in between.

Yes.

But the local restaurant quality will hopefully reflect the presence of tourists. My area (rural Western WA) has a number of hotsy totsy National Park lodge restaurants and they’re open even during slow times.

 

[Bonnie]

Here’s a biggie:

The parish situation can often be dismal.

I wasn’t going to mention that, thinking it was just our area. But I guess not! After a string of mostly not-so-good priests, we got fed up and started going to a different parish. Then we got 2 excellent priests - but they cover 5 parishes.

I’m afraid these wonderful men will get burned out or transfered (the average stay has been 2 years) and we’ll go back to the usual lackluster priests.

 

[PolarGuy]

Issues re: Parish “situations” are actually important to think about.

In my busy suburban parish we have 3 priests & a retired one who helps out a bit. There are 2 other parishes within 2 miles. With that, it is easy to find some priest you really like; odds are 1 will give great homilies, etc.

In the country? No way. There’s usually 1 priest for miles around. People are people. Some folks won’t like him; he won’t like someone else; things are hard.

Now, a true story: My rural town for years had 2 parishes, each with 1 priest. One was the “French” parish, heavily influenced by the French Canadians who came south to the Northern USA before it was the USA. The other parish was the “Irish” parish, influenced by the Irish-Americans moving up from the South. They each had 1 priest. The parishes were competitive with one another – so much so that they each scheduled their masses for the exact same times, i.e., you basically were forced to pick one or the other. In fact the Irish priest said a VERY fast mass by not giving a homily; we’re talking 30 minutes on a Sunday The French priest looked for any reason to dispense with the homily too, because he knew people would go to whatever mass was shorter. Eventually, 1 closed. I swore when that occurred I remember thinking, “the parishoners from the one that closed may not join the other parish; they may go out of town.” I think that occurred but I left town. (the Irish Church closed; the Church got knocked down and is now a parking lot; my parents were married there, and I’m still sad they couldn’t at least keep the church vacant rather than need to knock it down). Not content with that, the awesome diner we used to go to after mass got knocked down as well. Sad.

(I would give a very large sum to anyone who, just on what I said, could identify the parishes or the town; it really is a very small world).

 

[1ke]

Well, we’ve all pretty much covered many of the drawbacks of living in small towns or rural areas.

But there are many good aspects as well. I do like the pace of life, and frankly when I go back to the city now I get stressed by freeway driving, crowds, parking lots, dirty/stinkiness, and pollution.

Small town life is nice in a lot of ways, at least here. All the kids get to play sports or band or whatever, not just the ones the teachers/coach hand picks b/c of talent. Most the kids get to participate in a lot of things, including county fair and 4H if they want to. While there is a blue collar mentality, that doesn’t mean you have to raise your own children that way. My nieces and nephews in both the big city and small town are exposed to many ideas and interesting, stimulating things.

The internet is your friend when it comes to shopping, and I spend less anyway when there is no Williams-Sonoma nearby! ha!

You **generally **don’t have to worry if you leave your door unlocked when you live in the country, either on purpose or by accident. Heck, we didn’t even have keys to our house for 10 years until we replaced the door knobs, so we never locked the doors at all.

In the winter, people here go into Walmart and leave their car running, and it’s still there when they come out.

The restaurant thing is a drag, but more ethnic foods are showing up in small towns, especially Mexian/Hispanic food. We also have a Chinese restaurant! ha ha.

Netflix and satellite makes it more bearable to not have a megaplex movie theater nearby. I guess that’s personal preference anyway, some people rarely go to movies even though they can.

Jobs can be more scarce and lower paying, but cost of living can be a big factor too. I pay WAY less for haircut, highlights, and etc., here than when I lived in the city. Same for a lot of other services. Some things do cost more.

If people are in need, others notice and care. There are always benefits going on for people who have cancer, had a house fire, or just fell on hard times. People will help older folks by just mowing their yard for them or plowing snow-- and not for money. The up side of everyone knowing your business is that you are not alone in your trouble.

I think life in the city and life in the country are-- for the most part-- what YOU make of them.

 

[Xantippe]

Well, we’ve all pretty much covered many of the drawbacks of living in small towns or rural areas.

But there are many good aspects as well. I do like the pace of life, and frankly when I go back to the city now I get stressed by freeway driving, crowds, parking lots, dirty/stinkiness, and pollution.

Small town life is nice in a lot of ways, at least here. All the kids get to play sports or band or whatever, not just the ones the teachers/coach hand picks b/c of talent. Most the kids get to participate in a lot of things, including county fair and 4H if they want to. While there is a blue collar mentality, that doesn’t mean you have to raise your own children that way. My nieces and nephews in both the big city and small town are exposed to many ideas and interesting, stimulating things.

The internet is your friend when it comes to shopping, and I spend less anyway when there is no Williams-Sonoma nearby! ha!

You **generally **don’t have to worry if you leave your door unlocked when you live in the country, either on purpose or by accident. Heck, we didn’t even have keys to our house for 10 years until we replaced the door knobs, so we never locked the doors at all.

In the winter, people here go into Walmart and leave their car running, and it’s still there when they come out.

The restaurant thing is a drag, but more ethnic foods are showing up in small towns, especially Mexian/Hispanic food. We also have a Chinese restaurant! ha ha.

Netflix and satellite makes it more bearable to not have a megaplex movie theater nearby. I guess that’s personal preference anyway, some people rarely go to movies even though they can.

Jobs can be more scarce and lower paying, but cost of living can be a big factor too. I pay WAY less for haircut, highlights, and etc., here than when I lived in the city. Same for a lot of other services. Some things do cost more.

If people are in need, others notice and care. There are always benefits going on for people who have cancer, had a house fire, or just fell on hard times. People will help older folks by just mowing their yard for them or plowing snow-- and not for money. The up side of everyone knowing your business is that you are not alone in your trouble.

I think life in the city and life in the country are-- for the most part-- what YOU make of them.

Right.

Quite true about Mexican and Chinese. My home town tends to have 1-2 Chinese restaurants at any time, as well as 2+ Mexican or Latin American places.

 

[Ridgerunner]

I in the country about 12 miles away from the nearest town (pop 4,500). I graduated high school in that town.

Although there are a few benefits of living in a small town, there are lots of downsides.

The nearest Wal-Mart was 30 minutes away. The only places to shop in my hometown were the grocery store (very small, certainly no espresso bar), and the dollar store. Jobs were very low paying and there weren’t enough of them. Living in a rural area, you usually don’t have a choice about your child’s school-so if it’s bad, it’s bad. Many rural communities and small towns are plagued with methamphetamine, meth labs, and the crimes that result from the drug trade. It’s cliche, but it’s true-everyone knows your business. There is no anonymity in a small town.

But my biggest problem with rural areas is that there is often a culture of poverty. Children are often discouraged from higher education or even moving out and into a city. People are can be very fearful of new people, cultures, and ideas. Growing up, my mom and brother both made it very clear to me that I was going to college. But when I would tell people that as a kid, they would tell me “you have big ideas”. People were eager to tell you that you were a snob who thought you were better than everyone else if you were a senior in high school who had a college acceptance letter. Teen pregnancy and unwed pregnancy in general are more the norm in my small town than they are in any city I’ve ever lived in. It’s not that they are bad people, but but being poor, uneducated, and working for minimum wage or just above it for decades is a way of life for a lot of people, and it’s one that they are proud of-and that’s sad. I looked up the stats a few years ago and just shy of 60% of the kids in my district were on the free/reduced lunch program. No one bats and eye because everyone is poor, no one is making it on their own, and it’s so normalized.

If you choose to move your family to an area like that, you need to be aware of the culture. This is a message that your kids may even get from their own teachers in school!

Sorry for the rant. I was actually just talking with my best friend a few days ago about how sad it is that so many kind and intelligent people that I went to high school with never did anything with their lives. It really irks me.

This is interesting, but it confirms two things in my mind:

1. The place you’re talking about is poorer than a lot of other rural areas.
2. The segregation by socioeconomic class that exists in cities is generally not there in rural communities. My own children knew poor people quite well. The children of my brother, who lives in a nice suburb never did. In rural communities one necessarily knows all kinds of people; educated, uneducated, poor, middling, wealthy. Ambitious, unambitious. Brilliant, stupid. Afflicted with substance problems, unafflicted. Black, white, brown, Asian. In a rural community, you know them all personally, and you have to learn to understand them and to get along together.

As between the two, one might well choose the segregation afforded by urban life, (and is nearly inevitable there for most) and there are those who wouldn’t want it any other way. Personally, I’m glad my children learned to personally know all kinds.

But it must be admitted that any growing small town is almost always going to have some significant out-migration because there aren’t enough jobs of the sort to fit all talents. I am aware of one small town in my area that is actually a destination for the super-skilled because it has a strong industrial base requiring a myriad of specialized skills and education and which also includes two software design/manufacturers.

But that’s unusual, I’m sure.

There are, in some places, lots of jobs for the highly educated in larger towns. Springfield, Mo in my area being one of them, the Springdale, Bentonville, Rogers, Fayetteville complex in Ark being another. A lot of those people don’t actually live in those towns (cities) but live in small towns or in the countryside surrounding them.

As I said before, it varies a lot from place to place.