Quite often, we hear tales of a person’s adventure of moving from a small town to a big town. Maybe they want to make it "big," or always dreamt of living somewhere as cliché and alluring as New York City. The roles reversed are never quite talked about, however, when you move from a big city to a small town there are certain realities you come to face:
1. When nothing is open late night
You roll up to your favorite restaurant at 10 p.m. and.. wait, what? They’re closed? The restaurants back home were always open until 2 a.m. and now you have no clue where to get a late-night quesadilla. Not only do restaurants close, practically everything does and the city quiets down. No one is even on the road. You half expect a tumbleweed to fly by.
2. Everyone is a lot more "country" than you expected
You missed the "camo" memo and no matter how hard you try, you still can’t get into country music. Camo is the only thing people wear and country music is the only genre that stations play, yet you refuse to conform.
3. There’s never big name artists that come
Big name artists used to play in the amphitheaters in your city, however now, the only way to see them is by taking a road trip. Realistically, it's understandable that Beyoncé would never dare put Gainesville, Florida on her tour route. Does anyone want to split gas money?
4. You still don’t understand the city limits
You don’t really have a grip on the perimeters of the town because it's all surrounded by farms??
5. When you meet another city person you have so much in common
Big city people just get it.
6. People tell you where they're from and you’ve never even heard of that town
On long road trips, you always see small towns off certain exits and you think to yourself, “Who even lives there?” Now, you meet people from towns with these obscure names that you didn’t even know existed in your state.
7. Some of the townspeople are just plain weird
There are definitely some interesting characters that you find out and about. You wonder about their backstory and how they even ended up in this town.
8. You take a lot of day trips
Fun stuff is usually an hour and a half away, so you find yourself leaving town quite frequently for day trips. Maybe a neighboring city has a blueberry farm, or perhaps there’s a historical site you'd like to visit.
Maybe you moved to a smaller town for college, or perhaps you wanted to try out a slower and simpler lifestyle. Regardless of the means in which you ended up in a small town, you might end up getting used to this different way of living. And if not? You can always pack your bags and start again.
