I guess it also depends on YOUR type of character too.

For example, I am a not-so-social type of guy. I like to spend more time alone ( which is not possible most of the time). In a large sity, most people will leave you alone and mind their own business. This is BIG for me. My brother, on the other hand, is a "people" type of guy. He feels more comfy around people chatting about everything under the sun, from latest smart phone to last trip to wherever. I am the exact opposite. When I buy a car or cell phone I hate to see someone (even my own brother) going through the car and discussing what features it has and what it doesn't have. He can buy a car with all the gizmos he likes but he should not ask me why I buy the simplest model. It is my own business.

So, this is why my brother stays in home town while I moved to larger town where even relatives do not see each other that much.

I like living in small town because I love the outdoors. I need space to roam around the woods.

You're lucky. My small down was smack in the middle of a zillion square miles of prairie. Nothing but hundreds of thousands of acres of wheat and weeds as far as the eye could see.

Grew up in a small town along the Ohio River Valley. 5,000 people in its heyday of the late 1970s. Coal and Steel were the industries. Steel is gone, a couple of the mines are coming back a bit and fracking for gas (no jokes here please) is going strong in the area

Today it maybe has 2,500 residents.

I left to go to college and earn a living as did may from my generation. I still go back several times a year (parents still in the house they bought in 1949). I now live in the Columbus metro area in a suburb that at least provides a few of the same benefits of my small town and I liked NightHiker's observations. I'm surprised that a surprisingly large number of the people that attend my place of worship are also from "The Valley"

We have a whole town reunion every year. HS football team went undefeated this year. It the kind of community with a lot of pride (but not the arrogang kind).... more of a humble gratitude for shared accomplishment and a work ethich I seldom see anymore. If things ever get "bad" here, my family and I are prepared to return there. I'm fortunate that my small town is the kind of place where 99% of the people will stand up and support each other and everyone know who the other 1% are to be avoided. Keeping in touch gives me that confidence.

The one thing about small towns is that a significant percentage of the population ends up being related either by blood or marriage (please no "inbred" jokes here) and that builds strong bonds.

I think the John "Cougar" Mellencamp song says it pretty well for me.



buckeye

Phaedrus,

Reminds me of that Garth Brooks song, something about working for a young widow one summer in the middle of a thousand miles of wheat fields.

Ironwood

If you are a little different from the average folks in the small town you want to move to, you may find it harder to become a part of any group. No, I am not necessarily saying small towns are "close minded" regarding the usual hot button cultural issues. There are also social groups in place, and they include the membership they include for a reason -- some possibilities may include petty personal disagreements to big political commitments. You will have to be able to fit in, and the wiggle room may be narrower.

Big cities have more groups, and the groups often have to be more tolerant because people regularly come into contact with people who are not like them. The chances are better that you'll eventually find your niche.

I personally recommend against groups. They drive me nuts. There is always someone you can't stand. Instead, I just have friends, and we have a good time.

I find the "groups" thing can be overcome and "shown by your actions", these include (for my wife and I anyhow) direct involvement in community minded activities, non-profits, fire/EMS, Parent Teacher Association/PTA, Scouting, church groups, AND helping others in their time of need. Granted I have been in my "new" location for 15 years, but I m very well networked and ingrained in our new community now. We are hard working, humble, active and "solid folks" and at least in this part of the country that is uniformly accepted/respected as the norm.

Buckeye, I too am from a former Steel Valley in Ohio (not yours) but it very well rings true for me as well. That is nice

Ironwood

In any social interaction, one bears only a part, but definitely a part, of the burden, and so do the others. The onus shouldn't be all on "the new guy." The "group" bears a part of the burden, too. There has to be a fit. For example, take the CERT people I trained with (and whom I continue to meet with regularly) as a group. During training, one well-intentioned instructor said something to the effect of, "there are some foreigners in our town, so terrorism could happen here." She was aware that most foreigners are not terrorists, and of course she was aware that CERT doesn't deal with terrorism. This is the sort of thinking of someone who's been kind of isolated from the larger world: outsiders = danger. Sure, there are nutty, paranoid big city folks who think foreigners are terrorists, but I'd think most people realize that there are so many foreigners living amidst us, that citizenship is a really poor, really impractical litmus test for catching a terrorist. I don't know about the foreign folks in the town, but I wouldn't want to befriend that particular CERT person. I put up enough nonsense at work already. I don't need to get it from my friends.

As for hard-working and humble, there are some people like that in small towns. But objectively, small-town people just don't have the economic opportunities to work as hard as some big city folks. Some friends of mine (employed by NYC firms) went to work at 7 AM, and came home at 12 AM. Yes, you read the times right. Sure, the company took them to and back from work in limousines, but many of them developed health problems. As for humility, this is something that needs to be tested for it to be real. Not saying it can't happen in a small town, but certainly other places offer more opportunities for trials of life. But all of this is just statistics and probabilities. Character always comes down to the individual, and true character is as hard to find in a big city as in a small town.