My childhood was spent in a small town surrounded by bluffs. After graduation, I moved to Minneapolis, where the population and buildings significantly increased. It wasn’t until I started adjusting to the city life that I realized just how funny, weird or unique my experiences were during my childhood just because I lived in a small town. Here are the 20 things you hopefully understand if you ever lived in small town (otherwise maybe I just had a weird childhood).

1. We drank bagged milk.

I never thought twice about the fact that I had to cut a hole in the top of a bag to pour my milk.

2. We did not have stop lights.

There is approximately one stop light per small town where I live. This is also the same stop light we had to go through three times during our driver’s test because little did we know in the future, we would actually have to know how to maneuver these foreign things.

3. We saw tractors literally everywhere.

It was a typical Wednesday afternoon if you had to follow a tractor for a quarter of a mile on the highway before you were able to pass them

4. We only had tractor jams, not traffic jams.

And the only reason there would even be a six-car traffic jam is if the person right behind the tractor refused to pass it, forcing the rest of us to chug along at five miles per hour.

5. We had tons of pets.

During the course of my childhood, my sister and I had one hamster, two dogs, three bunnies, four fish, five cats and one too many chickens (I hate chickens).

6. We were always able to see the stars.

Whenever I sit on our roof in the cities and look up at the empty sky, I just imagine how beautiful the stars look back home.

7. We didn’t have a campfire, we had bonfires.

We have a fire pit in our yard that is casually six-feet by six-feet which gets stacked ten-feet tall before we burn it. We have to bring over the watering hose to spray the tree that hangs above the pit so it doesn’t catch fire.

8. We had trap shoots and made big bangs.

My dad held a 13-year long annual trap shoot where all the families from my town would drive out to our house in the middle of nowhere with a cooler of beer and their shotguns and shoot clay pigeons till sundown. And of course, there was the infamous rebel of the group who would set off dynamite in the field. Yet no one was concerned when half the hillside would be burning because they would just keep on shooting their clay pigeons.

9. We didn't have an uptown or downtown, we just had a town.

In fact, my town was just a street and if you weren’t paying attention, you could probably drive through it without realizing you just drove through it.

10. We knew everyone in our grade.

Not only did you know their first and last name, but you also knew all of their siblings, a fun fact about them and probably their life story.

11. We always saw wildlife.

Have I sprinted away from a skunk while I was running? Yes. Did I pick up a "dead" possum in my yard when I was younger? Sure did. Did I see deer wandering in our yard outside the kitchen porch during breakfast? All the time.

12. If we met a single car while driving in the valley, it was a busy day.

It was always big news during our family dinner if someone saw more than three cars on our valley’s backroads while driving home.

13. We didn't have neighbors.

I live on a college campus and my neighbors are the stereotypical college students that like to have large social gatherings on a Sunday night during finals. In the country, my closest neighbor was a half a mile away, so the only noise we had to worry about was the annoying frogs croaking at 4:00 in the morning. Oh, and those damn chickens.

14. We had hiking trails in your backyard.

There is some unmowed grass in the cities, that sometimes feels like hiking...

15. We couldn't order food.

Unfortunately, the nearest Pizza Hut (about 20 miles away) refused to drive into the forest to deliver a cheese pizza. I remember coming to college and having a blast unnecessarily ordering food.

16. We didn't fill up our own gas tank.

At our local gas station, the kind workers would fill up the gas for you and since they knew you by name, they automatically would charge it to your account. And, I am ashamed to say that because of this handy set up, I didn’t learn to fill up my own gas for a concerningly long period.

17. We had a small town which made an even more of a 'small world.'

Fun fact, my high school boss was actually my dad’s boss when he was in high school. Although my dad worked at a grocery store and ran around having squirt gun fights, I worked at a marina and tanned on my down time (he was a pretty great boss). When everyone lives in the same clumped small towns for their entire lives, everyone is connected to another by more than just coincidence.

18. We had a total of 12 TV channels.

Needless to say, I had every episode of “Arthur” memorized because it was the only good channel we received other than “Judge Judy,” which my mom didn’t let my sister and I watch.

19. We had a local pond that was also officially the local pool.

It had turtle and tadpoles, but hey it at least had some sand.

20. We waved at everyone.

It did not matter if you knew the person or not, it is customary to wave at all passing person in the valley.