Growing up in a small town was both a blessing and a curse. Now that I am in college I definitely appreciate where I grew up a lot more than I did when I was living there all the time. In my eyes there was never anything fun to do and I seemed to be bored all the time. I found whatever I could to do, which involved a lot of sporting events, hanging out with my friends and binge-watching Netflix.
At the time, these seemed like boring things and when I would go to my friends house we would watch movies and just talk until way too late. I wanted to do things that were more fun, but we had to drive at least 20 minutes to get to a Target much less any other remotely interesting place.
But growing up in a small town did teach me some very valuable things.
First things first I learned to value my family. You're not going to be around them forever. Personally, I had two older sisters and it wasn't long before they were gone to college. When I was the only child left I knew I took for granted all the times my sisters were around. When we were younger and I was bored I would just get one of my sisters to play Barbies with me or play some sort of pretend game like school.
Now I was older and I didn't have any built-in best friends living with me. Now that I'm in college I value my family even more because I don't get to see them every day. My family was really close when I was growing up, so I miss just being around them all the time.
Another thing I learned to was to value real friendships. In every town, there are fake people that will be nice to your face but talk behind your back. In my town, there were quite a lot of fake people. I hated this. Why do people feel the need to be fake? If someone won't accept you for who you are who cares?
Find people that will because those people are out there. In high school, I found those people. The kind of people that you can just be yourself around and they still love you. So to my friends from high school that I still keep in touch with, I love you guys.
With small towns comes another lesson you should learn as early as possible, be careful who you trust. In a small town, it is very easy for you to tell one person something and that something gets around to pretty much everyone in the town. People talk, a lot. Especially in my town, and it wasn't just the kids that would talk and gossip, the parents would too.
A certain group of parents comes to mind with this one, and I knew to not trust the kids of those parents too much. You need to learn who can keep your secrets and who will spread them. This ties into valuing real friendships because your friends are the people you can trust with anything.
With there not being many things to do in a small town, I learned all about small town pride. In my town, this pride came with sports. We weren't always the best, but there was endless support from the community. You could find me in the student section cheering on my peers whenever possible. I loved being in the stands watching my friends do what I wasn't as good at. The stands would be packed with people at most home games. Everyone wanted to show their pride for the teams.
Even in college, it is fun to go back to sporting events and cheer on my friends that are still in high school. The stands never seem to get emptier as the years go by. I learned to appreciate cheering on my friends no matter how badly they were losing or how bad the team's season was in general, and my town had some pretty bad seasons with certain sports *cough* football *cough*.
Growing up in a small town isn't the only way you can learn this next lesson, but it definitely helped me learn it. Quality over quantity is a big part of growing up in general. It is important to learn it doesn't matter how many of something you have, especially friends. What matters is how great those friends are. I learned that I didn't need a bunch of friends, I just needed the friends I had to be really good people. I am happy to know that I have those people in my life. My friends are some of the greatest people I know and I hope to keep them in my life for a long time because they make me a better person.
When the nearest "big" towns are at least 20 minutes away, you learn to appreciate the small things. Things that seem so small and dumb can really be the best memories you take with you through life. You don't have to do big, extravagant things to have fun and make memories. Things like sleepovers with your friends, going out to eat, and even a trip to the grocery store can create such fun memories.
There are so many times that I took for granted having my dog sleeping at the end of my bed or my best friends only living 5 minutes away. Having a meal with your family or having a family game night, it all was taken for granted and it took me a whole two days at college to realize that.
Lastly, it is important to remember there are bigger (and better) things out there. You will not be stuck in your small town forever (unless you make yourself get stuck there). The possibilities for everyone are limitless. If you want to get away, do it. Go to college in California, take a gap year in a different place to save some money before going to college, or just travel the world. Overall, just follow your heart to wherever and do something that makes you happy. It doesn't even have to be far away or a huge thing, and it can be as simple as moving to a city with a bigger population or just getting a job that you think is fun.
The population of the town my college is in is only a few thousand more than my hometown, and that's okay with me. I know that I don't have to stay in small towns my whole life. I know that I could transfer to a college in a bigger city anytime I want to, or I can move to a big city once I complete college.
Your hometown doesn't define you, you define you. Even though at the time all I wanted to do was get out of my small hometown, I have found out so many things I learned from living in that town. It wasn't all that bad and now that I'm not there all the time, I realize just how great my hometown was and still is (especially Minnesota's Largest Candy Store).
