Things Small Town Living is Lacking
I grew up in a pretty large city. Traffic, loud streets, you’d hear sirens regularly throughout the day. Everything you need at your fingertips or can be ordered in super quick. This was the only lifestyle I knew. Pure convenience. But I always knew I wanted something different. I did not know it early on, but I craved a slower way of living. More peace within my life.
I just knew I did not want to raise my future children in the city I was living in. It was no longer the place I remembered from my own childhood. It grew rapidly, became incredibly busy and the violence and crime was escalating. It didn’t feel like a safe environment any longer, nor did it feel like I was meant to be there anymore.
The struggle I initially I had with moving away from the city was leaving my family behind. When I initially moved out on my own, I moved within 10 minutes of my family’s home. It was more of the gaining independence by living on my own, but still being close enough to where I could visit very frequently.
When I first moved away with my boyfriend (now husband) we moved in the dead of winter, his job caused him to be away for days at a time and I was completely on my own, in a town that I didn’t know anyone and it felt super isolating. It would take me an hour to visit my family and I felt very alone in the very beginning. We moved to a town that had one stop light, one tiny grocery store, no easy take out, no such thing as Uber or Save the Dishes. Oh, and we moved within a month of the Pandemic striking in 2020 and the lockdowns began, so that didn’t help.
Jump forward to now, we live in an even smaller populated town with and an even smaller grocery store, still no Uber or convenient food deliveries, a couple more stop lights as we live in a pass through to cottage country, but yet, I wouldn’t change it for the world. This is where we could afford to buy our first home, and this is where we have chosen to raise our kids, for the beginning at least. It is quiet, the people are kind, it feels safe, we have all of our basic needs met. I don’t think I could back to living in a larger city now. I have become accustomed to this new, slow way of living and I love it.
That all being said, there are some things small town living is seriously lacking that we hadn’t thought of until we made this our home.
Available Health Care. Walk-in-clinics. This one kind of sucks. While we have maintained our family doctor in other cities, it now takes us an hour and a half to get to appointments. The local doctors office has a wait list of years and years, and we don’t know if we plan on staying here that long to do the transfer. If one of us gets sick, we have to go to surrounding towns for a walk-in-clinic, as our own town has none. Even then, it is unlikely we will get seen, so our best bet is going to another towns emergency room at a hospital, which seems ridiculous and just clogs up our healthcare system.
Daycare. I have my son on 14 waitlists for a daycare spot and had placed him on these lists when he was 4 months old… he is now 2 years old and we haven’t even been called for any spots. These lists are not only in our town and with fully operated daycares, but also in surrounding towns and with home daycares too. Luckily, I can stay at home with my kids for the time being, but I am very aware that this is a luxury and we live a very frugal lifestyle to be able to afford doing this on one income. I would have never thought this would be so difficult, and we simply want to place him in a daycare part time, purely for the social aspect of it. So far, no dice. I put my daughter on these waitlists when she was 6 weeks old and still nothing. Rumor has it in town that you need to out your kids on the waitlists before they are even born, as soon as you have their due date, to even stand a chance. We do have playgroups we can utilize in town, and we certainly do, thank goodness.
Varieties of Amenities. While we have a local library, a couple restaurants, a grocery store, a pharmacy, a gas station, and a community center, we don’t have other simple things, like gyms or fitness classes, hairstylists or barbers, spas or nail salons, kids activities, sports and play places. While there are private options, which always cost more but there are some available, the selection is endless in a city. These are all available in surrounding towns and we have made ourselves familiar with where to go and who to see, its now a longer drive, it is booking in advance versus dropping in, it is the preplanning needed over fitting it into our every day.
To put things in basic terms, small town living is lacking convenience. It is the price we pay for enjoying peace and quiet, to smile and wave and chat with your neighbours over rushing by everyone. I can take my kids for a walk around town and feel safe versus cars racing by or filthy sidewalks. Our basic needs are met and we can outsource what we don’t have. Again, I wouldn’t change our small town living for a city any day. I have adjusted to this way of living and I love it for me, for my growing family and for our futures. It is certainly not for everyone, but it is our life and we love it. Sometimes change is a good thing and what we need in our lives to show us who we truly are and what we really want.
Melanie xoxox