is there something that you know that i don't?

apart from the obvious answer to the above question being "yes" in almost every case, i clarify to ask specifically whether people from small towns know something that i don't about living in small towns.

i very recently read a comment by an individual who is a stranger to me, who said that people in small towns remain there because they are "too uneducated or unmotivated to leave". is the same criticism made about people who want to move to small towns? are we just simple or lazy?

to be completely honest, i find city life both disheartening and unfulfilling. i was born and raised in a university town in southwestern ontario. i lived in the same house, on the same street, with the same neighbours from the day i was born until the day i moved away to university. i found my city living experience to be nothing special. for someone as mundane as i am, who even now in my early twenties doesn't enjoy going drinking at bars or doing excessive shopping in huge plazas, i didn't find being in the city to be anything but my routine. especially with my status as a student, and my lack of personal transportation (other than my two, only somewhat trusty, legs, of course), being in a city is more a necessity than a desire.

in truth, i'd love to move to the countryside. i like driving down long dirt roads. i like being surrounded by trees and grasses and streams. i feel so much more at peace with myself when i am not in the city, and i also feel so much more connected to the people that i am with. perhaps i feel this way because my trips out of the city were happy and memorable. but, i have wanted to live in a small town since before i was in high school, so, there must be something more to it than that.

but, i digress, and return again to my original question. what is it that people who are born and raised in small towns need to get away from? why would it be so terrible to go and "experience" life while getting higher education, or training, or travelling, or wandering (and so on), and then go back? did you not like being familiar with every street and every park and every person? did you not like being able to actually get lost in your backyard for the afternoon when you were a kid? what were you missing? the car horns, the smog, the sirens, the litter, the violence, the construction, the stripmalls, the cement gardens, the propaganda...? what, really? i'd be curious to know.

i'm mostly curious to find out whether you are just saying all those things because that is what people from small towns are expected to feel. i mean, almost any movie where the protagonist is born in a small town, the plot usually involves some grand scheme to break out of their situation and move up in the world, i.e. to the big city. are you just a coward, who doesn't want to admit to enjoying life in a small town amidst those friends of yours that actually wanted to move away? come on, get some balls. you only live once (or, so we'll say at the moment), so you might as well live where you want to live.

or, maybe you actually want to be in a box. my backyard was completely fenced in, and the grass area was too small for an inground swimming pool (for size comparison, not because we ever tried to get one). although my neighbourhood was nicely kept, with trees along the boulevard, and large parks for little league soccer and children learning to swing, you couldn't have a drink on your patio at the same time as your neighbour because he could hear you word for word. i especially like the new subdivisions where you have to choose your house from a select set of designs and colours. can we say cookie cutter? but, that is just me. as much as i am not that original, i at least know that i don't want to be told what brick and shingles i am going to build my house with.

and, on that note, what is wrong with restoring older homes? why do we all need brand new paper mansions? what bothers me on a daily basis is walking by century homes in guelph that have been allowed to get run down and dilapidated. the architecture is amazing, and the beauty is exquisite. but, i'll stop there. i could go on about how upsetting it is that people won't commit to retro-fitting older buildings for more energy efficient heating and cooling, or that people continue to consume beyond imagination despite the ever growing gap between the affluent and the impoverished. there are too many questions to be answered in just one post. one, or two will have to suffice.