If you’ve grown up in small-town USA, there’s a pretty good chance you had an upbringing similar to my own. Growing up, I always viewed my hometown being so small as a disadvantage. I saw it as a place to look forward to escaping from, rather than a place I would eventually find myself sometimes longing to return to. I didn’t appreciate what it meant to be raised in a place where I saw familiar faces in every aisle of the grocery store, knew every fellow classmate of mine by name, and had the ability to leave my car unlocked without a worry while I ran around town doing errands. Looking back on my small-town upbringing after being in college and meeting people from a variety of backgrounds and hometowns of varying populations, I’ve gradually grown to appreciate the fact I was raised in a tiny town in “the middle of nowhere.” Massive metropolises like New York City or Los Angeles might be interesting and cool cities to visit, but I wouldn’t trade my small hometown for them in a heartbeat. That being said, there were negatives to small-town life, too. Regardless of whether you enjoyed your small-town USA upbringing or you absolutely hated it, there are definitely ways it probably shaped you and affected you:

1. Being accustomed to peace and quiet.

2. Leading a slow-paced lifestyle.

3. You view a grocery store as a one-stop place for everything.

4. You aren’t used to parallel parking.

5. You don't worry about security or locking doors.

6. Keeping your secrets private feels impossible.

7. You enjoy staying up-to-date on town gossip.

8. Assuming people remember you or know who you are.

9. You're automatically friendly towards others.

10. Always being aware of events going on in the community, even if it's just bingo night.

11. It doesn't take a whole lot to entertain you.

12. Being familiar with seeing familiar faces everywhere you go.

13. You’re used to people not recognizing your hometown by name.

14. Your parents weren’t afraid to send you outside or around town without supervision.

15. You aren't a stranger to having your picture in the local newspaper.

16. You have to make a trip out of town to have a proper shopping spree.

17. Gravel/dirt roads don't phase you.

18. Naming off every single kid who was in your graduating class is easy.

19. You imagine living in a big city is glamorous.

20. You understand the power of a good homestyle restaurant.

21. You realize high school football trumps just about everything else on a Friday night.

22. You could spot an out-of-towner from a mile away.

23. When you think of "downtown," you think of a row of Ma & Pa businesses.

24. Church is about the only thing more important than high school football.

25. Moving to a college or to a big city takes a major adjustment.

As you can see, there are some major side effects of growing up in small-town USA. No matter where you choose to spend your college or adulthood years, small towns are special places with special people, and if you were lucky enough to grow up in one of these places, I hope you can appreciate it. Being proud of where you hail from, be the town big or small, a skyline of skyscrapers or endless cornfields, a town of gravel roads or four-lane highways, is something we need to all appreciate. After all, it's part of who we are, no matter where we go in life.