I grew up resenting where I lived and I still do. Coming back home from freshman year of college, or the first year of being away from home, will, of course, bring mixed emotions from any young adult (just as the Google search “coming back home from college” will aptly tell you). Moving from a small, suburban town to a major city causes an especially large shift in perspective. As a city person, what I did not realize was that moving from Nether Providence Township, PA to Brooklyn, NY would make me appreciate where I grew up.

When I was eight years old, my parents decided to move from the township of Upper Darby, PA (the famous hometown of Tina Fey) to Nether Providence Township, PA so I could get a better education, as the public school system in Upper Darby began its steady decline. Unfortunately, oftentimes in this country moving to “better” one’s education usually equates to moving to a predominantly white, upper-middle class suburb, an effect of institutionalized racism and classism (as best seen in the “white flight” of the 1950s). In Upper Darby, people from different races and cultural backgrounds than my own surrounded me, a fact I never realized before the move but greatly appreciated afterwards. Additionally, Nether Providence overwhelmingly lacks sidewalks and the houses are spread far apart. The center of Nether Providence Township is Swarthmore, PA, a place of high-minded intellectuals, many of who teach at the local college, much akin to Don DeLillo’s “College-on-the-Hill” in his novel White Noise. In high school, I came to realize a faux-liberalism and a sheltering type of parenting taking place; in a town in which everyone appeared open-minded, my own friends’ parents denied them from going into Philadelphia, a major cultural center a mere 20 minute train ride away, out of the great “fear of the unknown” (a fear which my own parents had never shown, perhaps because they work in Philadelphia and have taught me how to hold my own). Once, when a friend came into the city to see a movie with me after I ended an art class at one of Philadelphia’s art colleges, my friend’s father had accompanied her on the train and asked if we were okay taking the subway by ourselves. Another time, a friend’s parents were appalled that her college class took her into the city to view older, urban homes without their consent. More perversely, I knew kids who were shunned by and kicked out of their homes for being gay or transgender, I knew more who just did not acknowledge these facts about their children, yet most people in the town retain their liberal status.

Of course when I was eight, I lacked the words to properly express that this town was not what I looked for in way of a “better” education. What I did have was pink hair, black clothes and a fake nose piercing, but very few friends (of which I have only retained two or three). Now that I’m older, this experience makes me wonder what we, as a society, value in our education system because experience is not incorporated into GPA and does not get people into “good” colleges. Personally, I value working with a multitude of different people who can teach me about different ways of living, which is the reason why the majority of my working (and living/friendship) experience in high school occurred in Philadelphia, PA.

Above are the reasons why I still retain resentment for where I grew up. However, moving to Brooklyn, NY this past fall to study fashion design at Pratt Institute helped me realize why people enjoy living in Nether Providence Township. The three distinct reasons why I came to appreciate my small town are as follows:

1. Café Culture

As a caffeine obsessed individual even before my fast-paced surroundings matched my equally hyped-up brain, cafés were places of solace and joy for me when I lived in my town. Cafés acted as my main points of social interaction for their unique way of bringing people together under a common love: they are places to slow down and fuel up. In New York, however, café culture is almost non-existent; the pace of work and the price of rent are too much for cafés in which people can relax but get caffeinated simultaneously to exist. Many places try to cultivate a chill atmosphere, but most do not succeed in their attempts. Typically, caffeine exists as just another drug, not a social connector. Instead, bars mainly serve this purpose of connection and shared love of substance, but for someone who’s straight edge (not to mention under 21 without a fake ID) I miss this experience of my local cafés with their poetry groups and music nights.

2. Veganism and Vegetarianism are Normalized

Although both veganism and vegetarianism have become widely accepted in today’s society, as someone who does not fall under either of these categories but still loves tofu and tempeh, I have gotten some strange looks from people who are not vegan or vegetarian in New York. In my town, however, it is normal to want to eat this way while not defining as either of these groups. Most people I knew back home were vegetarian and vegetarian or vegan potlucks were the norm. For instance, in New York, if someone has a dinner party the main course will probably be neither vegetarian nor vegan, but there might be a special dish for the one vegetarian or vegan attending the party. Where I’m from the main course will be in at least one of these categories and everyone is completely okay with that.

3. Quiet and Nature

You must seek out quiet and nature in a city; in a suburb these qualities exist in abundance. Everywhere. As a solitary person, I love both quiet and nature as long as I have enough noise and social interaction to balance it out (after a year in Brooklyn, I definitely do).

If you go back home for summer, even if you hate your hometown, try to find something you may appreciate in having lived there. Find something that juxtaposes your new daily existence outside of your hometown and relish in it. Acknowledge how this place contributed to who you have become and how you handle life. And then get out of there!