I really love watching people’s faces when they visit a suburban town. “It’s so peaceful here!” they exclaim, taking in the view of the trees shading your backyard. “The air feels so much cleaner, wow!”

Relax, it’s just trees, they have those in your city too. The air is only a degree less polluted, it’s not going to cure your asthma. Small, quiet towns away from the population seem romantic... but only if you romanticize them.

The truth is that suburbia is the closest to hell that you can get without actually dying first. The quiet atmosphere is nice until it’s unbearable; until it’s something like looking into the void of the universe and finding that everything is motionless and nothing matters. The town looks empty at times and maybe this is your ideal setting for retirement, but living in suburbia is akin to a 101 class on how to feel completely alone at all times.

Yet somehow, regardless of the fact that other people seemed to have ceased to exist, everyone knows your business. Going to the local Starbucks? Not without seeing at least half of your graduating class, you aren’t. The senior girl that went to the same school as you a few years ago? She’s pregnant and literally everyone has an opinion on it.

Being completely immersed in the news and lives of the town makes sure that those who live in suburbia don’t exist outside of it. These people live exclusively inside the American Dream, with their dog and their two children. They mow the lawn and say good morning to their next door neighbor.

Suburbia feels more like a routine or habit than an actual, living human life. Here you can shut down your street for your child’s birthday party without ever worrying about the fact that this is a local road that other people drive on. Here you can live within your own perfectly peaceful fantasy of a white fence and handsome house without ever aspiring for more or for better. Here the town feels more like a corpse than a place on the map, and the people feel more like the walking dead than the hectic living.