Living in a Small Town: Dumb Assumptions pt. 1

 

First, but not the last, post on our transition to small town life from the city.

Win for small town living: movies here are cheap. There’s one movie theatre in our town and with a 2 for 1 coupon from the paper it’s only $4 to see a movie on a Saturday night. Add in that our sitter is $8/hr here (yeah for having a niece and nephew that babysit!) vs. the $16-$20/hr in Vancouver ($20/hr has been calculated as a livable wage in Vancouver), and date night is half off compared to the city. One of the reasons we moved here was for a lower cost of living and that’s proving true in many areas.

That’s not the only difference with movie night though. In true city mouse fashion we made a faux pas buying our tickets. We were nearby visiting the library (it’s beyond expectations good) in the afternoon and we thought we should pick up tickets in advance of the show that evening. This would be a common thing to do in the city – swing by and get tickets the day before or in the afternoon so you could assure you got a seat and could avoid all the long line ups that evening. Well, my husband really confused the cashier at the movie theatre. Apparently no one ever buys tickets in advance and their ticket system – they use those numbered draw tickets you get for 50/50 draws and such – wasn’t set up for it. He returned from the ticket buying with half of one of those 50/50 tickets and was told that if there was any confusion that evening we were to say ____’s name (the local movie theatre owner/operator) and that it was okay. That one half of a ticket was entry for both of us to that night’s show. After we went to the show that evening our city assumptions were even more obvious to us. The theatre was surprisingly large and a healthy turn out for a Saturday night movie here is a few dozen people. My brother had a good laugh at us and our “advance ticket”.

It’s slow and quiet here and so far we are loving it. I miss some things about the city, really mostly people right now, but I do not miss the noise from the number 17 bus that went by my bedroom window every twenty minutes. Of course, the number 17 was also incredibly useful to us, it took us over the Cambie bridge in a few minutes for doctor’s appointments and errands. As I continue to remind myself, no place is perfect.

Also, no place is without its wonderful surprises. The biggest initial surprise for me here: how cyclist and pedestrian friendly this town is. To step back a bit, before we moved I wondered how much we would cycle here as there are very few cycling paths, no protected cycling lanes and outside of the downtown area and the main road, there are very few sidewalks. With my city cycling eyes I doubted we could cycle easily here with the lack of infrastructure. In Vancouver I rarely cycled on roadways myself and wouldn’t allow my eight year old to ride in vehicle traffic: drivers were aggressive, didn’t give cyclists any space. And I was concerned about walking here, our favourite form of transportation, with the limited sidewalks. In Vancouver we practiced defensive pedestrianism, making eye contact with drivers, standing in the middle of the crosswalk with my arms out wide as my children crossed to assure drivers that weren’t looking over the hood of their car would either see me or, worst case, hit me and not them. I knew we would bike and walk in this small town I just expected to have to teach my kids an extra level of vigilance to protect them from vehicles.

Well, I made a dumb assumption. In Vancouver the focus seems to be on infrastructure to encourage active transportation. And I thought you could really only have active transportation with separated bike lanes, sidewalks and walking and cycle paths. What I have seen since moving to a small town is that less traffic and, SO IMPORTANT, drivers that are aware of pedestrians and cyclists, share the road with them and take ownership for their safety, creates safe active transportation options too. The first week here we rode bikes to school and daycare drop off every morning and afternoon. Everyday Chris and I commented on how drivers gave us so much room, slowed down or even stopped to let our young cyclist get ahead. Drivers waved at us, smiled at us and really saw us in a way that I did not experience living in a city. We’ve put more miles on our Yuba Mundo cargo bike since we got here than we did all summer. I’m even thinking about winterizing it….

The experience of cycling and walking in this small town has been such a wonderful surprise. I’ve guessed that the responsive and aware drivers here must be due to the fact that it’s so small, everyone knows everyone. They see people on the roadway and not only feel a responsibility to keep them safe but they may want to slow down, roll the window down, and say hi. Also, people aren’t in a rush here. It really takes no time at all to get places so there’s no need to speed. There’s no sidewalks so everyone really has to share the road. And, another win for this town, there are lots of people out walking and cycling. We aren’t alone. The healthy amount of non-drivers on the road makes it safer for everyone. Drivers aren’t surprised at the pack of kids walking home from school, the senior on his e-bike or the new young cyclist that’s taking up the whole road so the driver takes less than a minute out of his or her day and waits to pass.

Hopefully more nice surprises in store for us as we face our first ‘real’ winter. Snow in the forecast, winter boots are ready and kids are excited for snow angels and making snowpeople!

Has anyone else experienced this same culture – culture shock? I’d love to hear from anyone that has done the small town to big city or reverse. 

  • I’m originally from a very small place and married a big city fellow. We moved to a large urban centre and I struggled! My husband couldn’t believe I didn’t know how to ride the bus (I’d never been on anything but a school bus) or parallel park. I kept walking into doors because I assumed people would hold them for me. Now we’re back in the country and the shoe is on the other foot: how can he not know how to drive a lawnmower? Of course there’s no pizza delivery. You can’t run the water when the power’s out! It’s very charming to see him discover rural life.

  • I just found your wonderful blog! Yay! The topic of simplicity speaks to my heart and soul. Thank you for sharing your wisdom on the subject.

    I love small town living. I grew up in a big city in California, moved to a smallish town (San Luis Obispo) for college and now live slightly north in an even smaller town with my husband where we chose to raise our small children. While housing is still fairly expensive I really enjoy that most of my free time is spent walking among oak trees and playing at various parks with my children. The neighbors are friendly (for the most part) and everyone seems laid back, less worried about impressing others with “accomplishments” or fancy things, even those who have large estates. I love that!

  • “They see people on the roadway…,” “[p]eople” being the operative word. We are a non car-owning family and depend on active and public modes of transit to get around (walking is my personal fave). Fantastic post. You nailed the experience for many of us…looking forward to reading more of your writing. (*Just* learned of you this evening!)

    • Yeah for car-free families! We’ve been car-free on and off since having our first son eight years ago. This move to a small town necessitated buying a car but we are trying to use it as little as possible. Thanks for commenting and happy cycling + walking!

  • I moved from a farm and very small town (we’re talking 500 residents, and my graduating class was a big one at 24 kids) to Saskatoon, with about 240,000 people back then. It was a huge shock, especially with coping with living on my own for the first time as a 17 year old “adult”. I learned city mouse ways and have settled in likely forever (it’s been 18 years!), but when I visit my parents I remember and appreciate the community of a small town.

    • What an amazing experience that must have been! I’m sure at the time it was overwhelming, but also pretty exhilarating and confidence building to take such a big leap.

  • I have two “citified” friends that have moved to our very rural county. They were so freaked out when people would honk at them, thinking the honkers were mad. In truth, honking here is to get someone’s attention to say “hey, friend!” and wave. Sure we might also use it to warn someone they are about to back into us in the parking lot, but mostly for the former reason is a horn honked.
    I do miss pizza/food delivery though! But not the noise of traffic. Also, pets don’t have to be leashed here. You can’t tell on your neighbor for junk on their property, but on the flip side you can do what you want with your own.

    • Hahaha!! We were here over the summer, looking for a house to buy, and went out walking one night with my brother and his family. Every other car that passed us slowed down or stopped to chat to them. I was flabbergasted/enthralled with the zero degrees of separation in the town.

  • I went to college in a town that had a population of about 8000 people (4000 students, and 4000 permanent residents.) The pedestrian/cycling culture didn’t really surprise me, because I grew up in a suburb of Denver in the 1970s and streets full of unsupervised children on foot or bikes was just the norm back then. But what really threw me for a loop was the fact that nobody locked their doors… ever. One summer a few friends and I decided to rent a house and stay on campus. When we moved in, I asked for my set of keys, and was shocked to learn that there weren’t any. Apparently they’d been lost decades before and nobody ever bothered to replace them because nobody ever locked the doors!

  • The first thing I noticed about moving from Toronto to a town of less than 15,000 people is that drivers do NOT use their horn. We mistakenly did so at an intersection one day and were horribly shamed by 20 heads turning to stare at us with appalled looks. It was the first “citiot” trait we abandoned very, very quickly.

  • This is such a lovely observation of small-town life, sounds idyllic. I’ve only ever lived in big, noisy expensive cities and have been thinking recently about other options. You may not have noticed, but I’d be interested to hear how diverse it is where you are versus Vancouver – not just people, but things to do & see…? Is there much that you can’t do now?

    • There is a lot to do here but it’s different and sometimes on a smaller scale than Vancouver. The public library has been another great surprise: lots of programming for adults and children and I keep finding new release books available that there are long waitlists for in Vancouver. We don’t have a lot of parks here – I’d say there’s three for kids -and we were at parks 5+ days a week in Vancouver. But we have our backyard and a lot of space in our neighbourhood and in the town. And kids call our house and ask to come over frequently so there’s no shortage of playmates for the kids. We had our first snow fall and two streets over there’s a public path with big embankments perfect for sledding. In contrast, a day of sledding in Vancouver would have been an expensive and possibly arduous endeavour for the five of us (car share, install car seats, drive to mountains, pay for tickets, abandon it all an hour in if one of the kids has a meltdown).
      Probably the trickier piece is finding adult friends. It’s never easy to find new friends out of your school years, probably doubly so if you work for yourself from home, so that one will be a long term project.
      Fine dining or a variety of ethnic dining options are out. Very limited options for concerts and plays. There are lots of volunteer opportunities but that’s the same everywhere. But our days are pretty dominated with the goings on with three kids under 8. So far this town has been great for that.

      • So interesting – thanks so much for the perspective. It sounds like we need to have a good hard think about our priorities during the next phase in our life. We’re spoilt for choice at the moment, and I worry we’d feel deprived in some way, but perhaps the other positives make up for it.
        And I’m sure you’ll have no trouble getting to know people, you appear to have built up a wealth of experience over the last few years!

  • Coming from Australia, we found the drivers in all Canadian towns and cities we visited (including Vancouver) to be ultra courteous to pedestrians. We only had to step slightly too close to the curb and they’d stop, thinking we were about to cross the road! And we didn’t even have kids at that point! If you want to see drivers who are aggressive to cyclists and completely ignore pedestrians (even when they’re supposed to give way), visit Australia!

    Having said that, we moved from an inner city suburb to a leafy hills suburb which is more like a country town, but only 30 minutes from the city (downtown). We noticed the drivers here are usually more courteous than those in the city, although that may be because I had a baby not long after we moved here so have always been walking with a pram or toddler. The demographic here is mostly older people (retirees) and families so I suppose people have more time for each other.

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