Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
being accepted and making true friends,however, are 2 completely different things.
That is so true. Even if you are friendly and have good intentions, and do want to make friends, the demographics and the lack of peers in a small rural town can just literally ruin the experience for you. I am a single woman, with no children. In this town, all women do, and I mean ALL, is motherhood. There IS no lifestyle except small town motherhood. Well, I have no kids, and no relatives' to borrow, so scratch that. Then, everyone of any caliber is here is married. Now, men may not see it, but women sure do: No married woman wants a single, childless, debtfree, carefree woman hanging around her man. So, I am a threat. Nevermind that I have NO interest in anyone's husband as anything except a platonic accquaintance. I am still given the bum's rush and told to come back when I have my own man. Well, there's another problem for ya. There's nobody of my IQ and educational background to date or marry. And I need to have intellectual harmony in a relationship, or I am miserable. All my family are brains.
So, I decided to say 'bye to rural life unless a well-paid traveling job takes me back there. Small towns and rural areas are great for men to go to, because the men there are usually pretty free to do as they please, and they go out and do all kinds of things with the guys often without their families in tow. Women's lives, by contrast, are hugely constrained by family duties. women don't go out and do gal things without kids in tow, and small town women are VERY territorial and don't invite a single woman to their homes. I thought I'd break the ice by inviting and I got either polite declines or no-shows. So, trying to fit in as a single in a very segregated and married small society is just impossible, because the society doesn't have a place for single childless woman.
That is tedious and suspicious Cath western PA. If they were not so busy running around and cheating on their spouses all the time, maybe it would cross their minds that the whole world does not do that, lol!
Like I said, it has been very disappointing (crushing, actually) to constantly be given the brush-off when trying to establish close friendships. I want them, but people don't welcome or invite me.
By contrast, I have also lived in WV and elsewhere that is more "Southern." That is a totally different culture, and the people are much more self-confident and outgoing. I much preferred that, and consequently, my move will be in that direction, but also with access to a better educated and more prosperous urban area.
Location: Oklahoma(formerly SoCalif) Originally Mich,
13,387 posts, read 19,421,922 times
Reputation: 4611
Quote:
Originally Posted by SorryIMovedBack
That is so true. Even if you are friendly and have good intentions, and do want to make friends, the demographics and the lack of peers in a small rural town can just literally ruin the experience for you. I am a single woman, with no children. In this town, all women do, and I mean ALL, is motherhood. There IS no lifestyle except small town motherhood. Well, I have no kids, and no relatives' to borrow, so scratch that. Then, everyone of any caliber is here is married. Now, men may not see it, but women sure do: No married woman wants a single, childless, debtfree, carefree woman hanging around her man. So, I am a threat. Nevermind that I have NO interest in anyone's husband as anything except a platonic accquaintance. I am still given the bum's rush and told to come back when I have my own man. Well, there's another problem for ya. There's nobody of my IQ and educational background to date or marry. And I need to have intellectual harmony in a relationship, or I am miserable.
So, I decided to say 'bye to rural life unless a well-paid traveling job takes me back there. Small towns and rural areas are great for men to go to, because the men there are usually pretty free to do as they please, and they go out and do all kinds of things with the guys often without their families in tow. Women's lives, by contrast, are hugely constrained by family duties. women don't go out and do gal things without kids in tow, and small town women are VERY territorial and don't invite a single woman to their homes. I thought I'd break the ice by inviting and I got either polite declines or no-shows. So, trying to fit in as a single in a very segregated and married small society is just impossible, because the society doesn't have a place for single childless woman.
That is tedious and suspicious Cath western PA. If they were not so busy running around and cheating on their spouses all the time, maybe it would cross their minds that the whole world does not do that, lol!
Like I said, it has been very disappointing (crushing, actually) to constantly be given the brush-off when trying to establish close friendships. I want them, but people don't welcome or invite me.
By contrast, I have also lived in WV and elsewhere that is more "Southern." That is a totally different culture, and the people are much more self-confident and outgoing. I much preferred that, and consequently, my move will be in that direction, but also with access to a better educated and more prosperous urban area.
Next time make the approach with your clothes on and wear a staw hat and a corn cob pipe.
Thing is, you can take a stand on whatever you want. If people are hell-bent on holding you at arms' length and not accepting you, you can't make them, and nobody else standing in solidarity with you can make them, either. "The way it is" will CONTINUE to be "just the way it is" as long as the people who WANT it that way continue to make it that way. And insularity is typically very, very prized by those who propegate it. It's "just the way it is" for a reason...enough people want it that way that it IS that way. Making small, tight-knit, established communities "see the light" is generally a losing battle.
Hi there! I hear you loud and clear and I agree. I read your other post about your mom who moved to the town your dad was from and she's still called "Joe's wife" (just made up a name, I don't remember if you said Joe or not. In our case, it's exactly the same. My husband and I grew up in towns that are literally less than 10 minutes from where we live now, and you would think that we moved to a different country when we moved here. We've been here since 1991 and for the most part, the people are fine as long as you find the right people to hang around with and avoid the set of people (the "townies") who consider themselves the royalty of said town. There is often an invisible layer that can be felt, but not seen. It is a feeling that you get that you will never be "one of them" no matter how long you live here. I think it does matter whether one lives in an area where there are a lot of transplants and newcomers that welcome each other openly as they're all in the same boat, or living in an area where newcomers have to go through a period before they're "accepted." Sometimes, people don't have decade upon decade to wait for that to happen. Also, if one is of a different race, religion, or sexual orientation, then it becomes harder yet.
You are right when you talk of "small, tight-knit, established communities." Insularity is prized by those who propogate it, that is correct.
Lack of business zoning has pushed our community into economic depression. Old-timers like it that way. We have business zoning laws on almost every referendum and it comes out to about half of the people wanting it and the other half not. There is literally less than a hundred votes that keep us from allowing more businesses from coming into the area. We pay not only high property taxes for schools, but we also pay a special income tax to support our schools. Old-timers and their pension and social security checks are exempt from this tax so they keep voting to keep the business base out of town. The ironic thing is that the businesses that want to open up in our town are those from people who live in the town!!! These people are beyond reason. Trying to change a mindset is an exercise in futility. The only mindset that can be changed is our own. I'm not ready to do that (change my mindset to fit someone's else's).
I live in a rural, wheat farming town. Grew up in the city...wanted to give my kids a smaller area and feel safe newly divorced, moved here after divorce. Well, after closing on the home in this rural town, I found out the town is 50% swingers, and in reference to the single woman above; I can relate...though, I have kids...the women where I live are either or combined; loud mouthed, heavy drinking, swinging, or born and bread small town girls who married within the community and are threatened by a new single woman moving into town. If you are financially independent, take care of yourself, don't normally wear wranglers and have a chew ring in your back pocket...then you are not going to fit it. I have tried and tried...but if you are not from here, have relatives here, or are interested in farming or support the bowling or grown up softball league - then you are not accepted. Farmers and small town people are their own kind and only want people like them, here. I can accept that and that is why I am selling my home and moving on. We are a threat to people like this. They do not like change...and the women are threatened by a woman who doesn't have to depend on a man to survive, which you find a lot of that in more rural areas. Not saying it's everywhere...I think some small towns are wonderful...I just happened to pick a very strange and very seemingly unhappy people, that compromises it's ability to be known as a friendly rural area. I cannot wait to leave here.
Not sure if you'll ever see this, but we would love to have you in Colton, WA. It's a town of 400. It's bucolic, well-groomed and a per capita income higher than found in most towns of this tiny size. Retired farmers abound. It's predominately German Catholic -- was settled by that group around 1900. Great internet! Wonderful community of warm people. It's very rural but situated half-way between two towns of 30K (big city to us). One of those towns has a major research university. Lots of gravel roads and beautiful rolling topography.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
I hear you loud and clear and I agree. I read your other post about your mom who moved to the town your dad was from and she's still called "Joe's wife" (just made up a name, I don't remember if you said Joe or not.
