Ask Lemmy

My experience- YMMV. Be careful who you talk to and what gossip you engage in. Basically everyone knows everyone to some degree. Everybody is somebodies cousins friend or something. Its a good thing when you get used to it, more security and whatever, but it does mean that any social damage you do (cheating on someone for instance) will have far wider consequences than you realise.

Job hunting is extremely difficult for the same reason unless you're trained in some in-demand specialist skill. Every job goes to someone's cousin. In my last factory job we had an idiot working there, constantly on the verge of getting sacked, he attended a funeral one day and discovered that his dead cousin was also cousins with the manager. He was team leader the very next week for his overall diligence to duty.

The old joke, "If you want to live forever move to a small town because every day will feel like an eternity."

I've noticed that eccentric people tend to drift towards rural areas. My in-laws live in the middle of nowhere in the West Country in the UK and all of their neighbours are similar to them: eccentric singletons or couples with few friends.

I think this really, really depends on the country.

The selection shrinks... on everything. 30 beers on tap at that nice brewhouse becomes 3 at the local watering hole. 20 different unique restaraunts becomes a subway and a chinese place. Groceries? Sure, enjoy your walmart and dollar general.

The pond gets small really fucking quick. You will run into someone you know almost every time you leave the house. You can't just blend in and get away from anything. Including whatever reputation you develop.

It's honestly fucking awful.

How small are we talking? I moved from a large city (Ft. Lauderdale, FL 185k people) to an insanley large city (Brooklyn, NY 2.6 million) then as a sort of whip lash decided I wanted rural living so I took my RV to an area I was thinking of buying a few acres in (Mossyrock, WA ~1000 people) and plopped for a few months. It was not for me. Real "one coffee shop, one restaraunt, one bar" type place and while I loved it initially, the pain-in-the ass of day to day living was too much. Think 20 min drives to the closest gas station, 45 min drives to the nearest large grocer.

After moving around the area quite a bit, I landed on a place with ~35k people and to me, after two years, I am still loving it. Feels like small town rural living but downtown is a 10 min drive away with a bunch of eateries, bars, nightlife, etc.

Pros of 'smaller' town living (after trying a few areas that passed the vibe check):

• Community. With everything going on in the world right now it feels like you are powerless. Shrinking the scope of your action to your neighbors and your immediate area empowers you to make change in a way you've never felt before. You can participate and have direct impact in all sorts of ways, from city council meetings, to improvement projects, to just participating in a local farmers market.
• Safety. Some people may see this as a negative, and I guess it could be depending on how invasive your direct neighbors are lol, but for me on 5 acres it's been incredible. Everyone knows if something is amiss and are not afraid to 'ring the alarm' as it were. When I first bought the property I was parking along the road as it was very overgrown, countless people stopped and asked if I needed help with the car (assuming I had broken down) then proceeded to introduce themselves and have met a ton of people in this way.
• Affordability. Land and housing is cheaper, groceries stay the same (assuming you are near a main interstate). You can buy a house for the price of an apartment in a large city.
• Quiet. Being in a large city is being in the belly of the beast. The gears are turning all night long. With smaller city living, it's the opposite, peace and quiet, take a deep breath and relax. Night life and night owls still exist, but you have to go hunt them down.
• Less Police Presence. Crime rates drop inordinately as the population decreases, and with that, you see a lot less "boys in blue" - furthermore, because it's usually just a few people, you get to know them and have less anxiety with interactions.
• Gardens and Greenery. Speaks for itself, less population density == less concrete paradise == more biodiversity.

Cons:

• Commute. If you don't have a WFH gig, most smaller cities will not have an abundance of the type of work you do. You'll most likely have a commute so somewhere with light rail might be awesome for you if that's the case.
• Gentrification. Depending on where you come from and where you are moving to, you might be seen as a sort of 'colonizer.' I don't get that sneer but I did get several people making sure I was not coming from California LOL.
• Slower Pace. In FL it's known colloquially as "Cuban Time" basically meaning that time estimates should be taken with a grain of salt. The pace of the life is slower in a small town and you might find services taking forever to be completed. If you can relax and go with the flow though, it shouldn't be too much of an issue.

Ok this turned into an essay, this new coffee bean smacks. Best of luck!

Also Ontario, not quite as small as you are mentioning but I also came from a much bigger city:

• services you are used to and good you could find easily just... don't exist? My dryer broke and I wanted to find a laundry mat that had hours that worked for me and my work schedule, but nope.
• people are all up in each other's business and it's normal. Gone are the days where I could have a quiet cry on public transit (lol what public transit) - people pay so much attention to your comings and going
• because there is so much less anonymity you kind of have to make the effort to get along with people you might not otherwise like. Tangential: the number of people I see in unhealthy, unhappy relationships because they honestly "didn't have any other options" is wild.
• people are way more xenophobic than I expected. Casually racist too, not really understanding that it's racism. I know it's not everyone and I think it's because they don't know anyone belong to demographics that are different than them.
• I'm like a 6/10 on the scale of weirdo (not conforming to social norms) and no one even blinked back home. Here it's a problem for some people.
• if you need a recommendation for a service, honestly ask your neighbor or someone you generally trust. They will know someone and that person is usually pretty good. We asked our home inspector if they knew any well people and he gave us a first name. After some googling we found him and he was excellent lol.

Eta, thought of a few more:

• you said small town but didn't specify rural or not so this might not apply to you but the switch from municipal water to well and septic took a little adjustment. I went from surface water to ground water and the taste was very different but I got used to it quickly.
• also a rural thing: We ended up with a lot less land than we originally wanted because we didn't realize the lower land/house costs were in places with absolute shit satellite or cellular internet.
• way more drunk driving
• people here smoke a lot more weed than I would have expected, which is nice for me lol
• people have been really nice in general which is the flip side of the lack of anonymity.
• rural grocery stores are expensive. I'm looking at you, foodland. There aren't as many low cost grocery stores. I really, really miss the little green grocers I used to frequent.
• people take hockey very seriously. I guess that also explains the golf.

My friends who have often complained about boredom due to the lack of cultural options and nightlife.

My only surprise was how shit every nearby restaurant is

Here’s the thing about “groceries in town”. You will find deals at the deli/bakery and possibly the butcher areas of the store. Sometimes. That said, 80% of it is ridiculously priced.

What often happens is people store more food and bundle their drive into town for stuff.

I will, for example, do most of my grocery shopping after my last shift in a run. Less gas and bother and it’s on the way.

We have a large garden. Two freezers. Cold storage. Two fridges. Fruit trees. If a snow storm dropped and we were stuck for a month we’d be fine. The food would get boring, but we’d be fine.

The one danger to this move you’re making will be the sounds or lack thereof. Once you go rural you may have a very hard time going back to hearing people and their vehicles all the time. As in they become a point of grating stress until they stop.

The community ain't as wholesome... People are about as a nasty as they are in the big city but it is a lot more personal