so this is sorta off from another thread but I figure small town quirks deserve thier own space. So one in my town is married women. To secure people dont talk bad of the wife this is what is done. You stop by to drop something off for the husband and he is not home, just the wife. You stay in your truck and honk, she comes out you hand her the item but stay in your truck. she comes over to get something for her husband, she stands outside your bring item out place it in her car, talk is minimal. Conversations in stores short at a distance. You break the codes there you might be having sex, lol silly small town minds.
hah. I've found that small-town guys tend to be a lot more overprotective of their girlfriends as well. I suppose gossip would be a big part of life in small towns, especially the lives of housewives. one certainly wouldn't want to be caught letting the postman in the house!
a bit more of classic values hold-over from the puritanical era, probably. i have to admit, i rather like some of it. i got a good blend. small town guys are more fun.
I'm sure small town people are lots of fun, but since they're not exposed to a lot of diversity, is it reasonable to assume that they are less tolerant and/or open-minded than people from a city, for example? my father's from a small town and he told me he'd never seen a black person in his life until he left. said he was dumbfounded the first time he saw a real live one.
depends on where they're from, i suppose. but since small town people don't have a lotta money-oriented entertainments, they had to come up with their own. coming from SoCal like i did, i have to say it's hugely refreshing to be with someone who's only ideas of how to have fun involve city-oriented entertainments.
depends on the people, too. dave's not like that, but his best friend is. when one of his friends went of the rails and pretty much terrified me and kai, i called dave. he was living out of town trying to make a living. dave called up some friends of his to come around the house and check in on me and kai all the time. i never knew anyone else to have such a great, available crew of people willing to look out for their friends. most people i've ever known were just too busy. dave called one guy, who called three other guys. next thing you know i have the Dave Patrol when dave is 10 hours away. it was amazing. and one great thing about small town people is that yes, you wide up in a ditch because of the snowy roads or mud and within minutes there will be a buncha guys pulling up to pull you out of the ditch because that's all they have to entertain them that day. or an old man will pull up and put enough gas in your tank to get you to the next station, then fill it up the rest of the way for you without ever telling you his name. yeah, these things have happened to me. i couldn't imagine ever going back to the soulless existance of a world where people don't know their neighbors or are too self-consumed that they can't be bothered to lend a hand.
The people where my mother live are like that. I don't get it. If my husband's friends come over and he's not home, I feed them and put them to work. The trash isn't going to take itself out.
i think yank's small town must have a more perverted mind than the one i came from... life was definitely simpler there... football and beer was pretty much all there was to it... oh, and church... i don't think that's true at all. when i lived in the small town there was only one half-black person living there, so we were also never exposed to them. there were a few hardcore racists of course, but most people knew nothing of black people so they just assumed that they are in fact, the same as white people and left it at that.. then i moved to the city and it was completely different. most white people here hate black people, and from what i've witnessed, the opposite is even more true... although it does seem like people who move from small towns to the city end up being the most racist, after being raised with all the BS about how great race-relations are then being suddenly exposed to the reality of it so i guess in response to the question, small town people may appear to be more tolerant and open-minded, but it's actually due to ignorance (i don't mean that as an insult, just a lack of information)
great point. people certainly seem friendlier in small places, but I've been to huge cities and people have been super friendly and helpful. stuck in Kuala Lumpur with no money or phone, and a taxi driver lent me his couch for the night and took me to the bank next day. I guess people are people, good and bad, everywhere.
KC that is one of the reasons I do like living in a small town. I know that I can count on my community to help me out if I need it. I remember I was in a hurry to get to the hospital and there was a traffic jam due to road construction. One of the workers asked me why I looked so upset and I told him. He and his crew stopped what they were doing stopped what little traffic that was being allowed through and let me and only me go through. Oh we we all seem to wave at each other too.
Hehe. They do that in Pittsburgh where I went to college. It took me a while to get the hang of saying "Hi" to strangers.
I've lived in both small towns as well as large towns. I think both have their pros and cons really. Even though I live in a bigger town at the moment, there truly are a lot of nice neighbors where I live. They're always waving or stopping to chit-chat when they see my children and I out on our daily walks, or even if they see us driving around town, and of course, if we bump into one another at the grocery store. We're the "morning walkers", we get to know all the early risers in the neighborhood because we're always outside during the morning hours for a walk, unless it's pouring rain. A lot of the people in our neighborhood are elderly, and I think, probably lonely. They get a kick out of getting to interact with my kids, it makes them talk about their own children and their grandchildren. Anyway, the thing I disliked the most about living in a small town was the silly gossip that would go around. I think boredom plays a lot into that. *laughs*
