Small Town Syndrome: Why Home Isn’t Where My Heart Is
Whether you like it or not, everyone knows everyone around here.
There is a reason why big cities have such an allure to them. The ability to be invisible while simultaneously being as expressive — or as loud — as you please is an underrated blessing.
Cities are big and expansive with too many bodies floating around for anyone to be concerned with who you are and what is going on in your life. Whether your father owns the local bakery on placeholder street or your mother is a businesswoman at corporate company number seven, you’re a dime a dozen.
By no means am I painting city life as a utopia. There is a list of cons that are just as hefty as the pros. But in bigger cities, you’re bound to see new faces every day. If you want to escape the people you grew up with, you can take public transport to a different part of your city and explore. Many natives become tourists themselves when they venture out to a new part of their state or province.
There is always something new to experience.
But in smaller areas, you know the number of banks in a particular area by heart. You know that if you pass by your old gym, you’ll see a few classmates that you can’t remember the names of. You’re also bound to memorize the route to the three fun places in town that you’ve been to way too many times.
If I had to give a clear analogy of how it feels to be stuck in a small town, I’d say it parallels the process of a snake shedding its skin.
You feel out of place in your current surroundings so you feel the need to be elsewhere. Unfortunately, it’s not that simple and it’s an uncomfortable feeling.
In films, small towns are portrayed as close-knit, slow-paced communities where everybody knows everybody. As a person that grew up in a place where most of the population is either distantly related or knows each other’s family lineage from generations far gone, it’s very endearing. It provides the mental security of predictability.
On-screen portrayals of small towns in movies like What’s Eating Gilbert Grape depicted scenes that nearly gave me deja vu while watching them. Locals have been surrounded by familiar places and faces since birth, so everyone knows what to expect out of day-to-day life.
Most people here attended the same small selection of elementary, middle, and high schools. The people at the local grocers know shoppers by name because they’ve been around since childhood. Pastimes typically don’t exceed more than a handful of activities (not including drinking and smoking — which are done a concerning amount but who cares because what else is there to do). Opportunity is far and few between. Living and growing up is almost formulaic and the people are most likely just like you. They have morals, values, and a sense of ‘normalcy’ that is similar to your own.
It just makes sense, right?
Well, I guess. Here’s the thing.
The bubble we’ve grown up in supposedly encapsulates all things right and anything outside of that is subject to scrutiny.
After being raised in a community like the one described, I’m extraordinarily thankful for the foundation it created for me. I learned manners, how to be hospitable, and the importance of a support system.
But as I’ve gotten older and come to terms with the way life passes you by in a place like this, the ‘close-knit’ has started to quickly become suffocating. The familiarity is repetitive and isolation due to COVID has led me to live the same day on a continuous loop for months. The more I evolve and slowly realize what I want out of life, the more I feel compelled to leave the upbringing that made me who I am.
Growing up means lessening the tint on your rose-colored glasses little by little, and seeing life around your community for what it is.
Thin veils of kindness are worn on the faces of those who pry your troubles out of you to create gossip later on. People are openly discriminatory with little to no care as to how it affects others. Those who don’t fit a particular mold are treated like outcasts by the population. Having aspirations outside of a 9–5 corporate job is seen as naïve or unobtainable dreams (if the thought is entertained at all). Soon enough you realize that you don’t share similar interests with your old friends, and new ones are hard to come by in a place so secluded.
As the days went on, I came to realize I wanted more out of life than my home could provide for me.
I began detailing how I felt to friends more often as time went on but they never seemed to be able to relate to how I felt. Even if they could relate to wanting to relocate, they didn’t seem as antsy about it as I was. Older people I’d spoken to were even more uninterested in the idea of leaving. Some said it was because they enjoyed being surrounded by familiarity while others couldn’t be bothered with the hassle of relocating.
No matter who I spoke to, I could sense the sympathy they felt for my restless thoughts, but not much empathy was available because they were mostly content with living where we grew up.
Dissatisfied with the responses I received, I scoured the internet in hopes of finding an anonymous blog post, article, essay — anything from a stranger on the web who had felt what I was feeling and shared their experience. I found a few that related to exactly how I felt and stumbled upon a polysemic term called small-town syndrome.
There were two definitions offered. The first was, “an inflated sense of self stemming from growing up and having a large reputation in a small town.” The second was, “a feeling of restlessness to escape the confines of your small town.”
The latter hit me like a truck.
The former described a number of people I’d encountered throughout my life. For as long as I could remember, I wanted to live elsewhere. At the age of eight, I informed my mother of my plans to migrate to a bigger country to live out my adulthood. Ten years and a pandemic later, I identify with that feeling more than ever.
The life I’d end up living if I stayed had already been lived a thousand times, and I knew deep down inside I would’ve never been content going down that path.
Many people in small towns know that reputations are as permanent as can be. They precede you at a new job, school, or any new environment within your community. People are hyper-aware of the way they are perceived and care immensely about hiding their mistakes.
Although elders are undoubtedly the backbone of our communities — offering us knowledge, support, and guidance — they’re often the most resistant to cultural changes and progress.
In the year post high school graduation, I’ve felt a number of emotions that are common among newly vetted “adults.” Feelings of confusion, excitement, fear, uncertainty, and more.
Who was I gonna be? What should my life look like? Is college worth it? How much time do I have left to succeed?
Having the life of a sitting duck gave me an existential crisis. I am uncertain of how common this feeling is among people within the past year. People of my demographic are of special interest to me. Therefore, I’m publishing this journal piece in hopes that someone who is stuck in a similar situation will find solace in knowing that there is always light at the end of the tunnel.
I hope they become aware that stillness is also required for growth.
There is so much I could do. There are so many paths I could go down. So many places to be. Things to see. But as of today?
I’ll just have to keep on waiting.
