Hometown Outgrown You?

[vampiroporvida]

Hello all, as a man whose hometown here in the grand ol state of Texas has experienced a boom, not gentrification, just a creation of places for tourists, and the impacts it has negatively had on me, I was wondering if anyone else has a similar feeling. I long for what I loved, and the place that knew my name. We were connected in this small town. Not now.

Has your town essentially passed you by? Have you outgrown your town and no longer finds it holds that nourishment for your soul? Would you raise kids where you grew up?

Just a few things that have been hitting the brain waves lately in a desire to bring back the good old days, but knowing it is gone forever.

Cheers.

VPV

[Grumpyoldman]

My home town needs an enema. It was awesome when I was little. The butcher shop, general store, shoemaker, bakery, old library with the creaky wooden floors, the small hot dog stand & Sal's pizza. But now there is too much white trash, drugs & apathy. The only thing left is Sal's. But it doesn't taste the same.

[JC Motors]

I lived in my hometown for all of the 30 years of my life. It's not the same since I was a kid. Houses used to be well kept, and are now falling apart. Constant crime, plus there's really not a lot of store choices where I live

[k5]

I got outta my hometown close to a decade ago. it’s just a retirement town

[figurecollector]

We moved from my home town when I was 14. I went back periodically when we visited my grandparents and for years after I was married, but after they passed, I have not gone back there (it has been since 1992). Since then, they have torn down everything I ever knew such as the hospital I was born in, the elementary school and junior high I attended, the high school my parents attended was abandoned and I would have attended if we had lived there that long and they added an addition to the home I lived in so that it does not resemble what it had looked like.

[Mongo Bears]

I live in the town over from where I grew up.
The wages, real estate and education are the only reason I am around.
I left for a while when I was young and single but when time came to have a career, investment and family then the only choice was to be back home. I will be gone again once my kids both graduate.

[RSCTom]

Kind of the opposite effect for me. Hoped when I was younger and even after long since moving away it would become more forward thinking and provide more options not just for kids like me who lived there or anyone who would like to move there as it's a beautiful place. But stagnation kills!

[Scott!]

I live in Glasgow, Scotland. But when I was 15 I moved up to a wee village called Boat of Garten where my dad worked at the holiday camp (caravan/tent type holiday park). That was a huge culture shock, you could walk from one end to the other in 5 minutes. It had 1 shop that closed at 6 o’clock and coming from a big city to that I couldn’t cope with it. I don’t think I’ll ever leave Glasgow, theres always something going on and being in such a quiet wee village I just couldn’t stand it.

[HHH316]

With my small hometown, I was a "big fish in a small pond." Eventually we moved to the Chicago area and life was drastically different. We'd be back visiting family all of the time and I always said I would want to move back. As I grew older, I realized there was nothing left there for me. No opportunities, career, social life, etc. I outgrew it and could now never see myself going back.

[Mclovin]

No, I outgrown my hometown. I'm 16 years old. A few years ago I decided that I want nothing to do with my town. Or the entire state of Indiana for that matter. It just isn't what I want out of life anymore. I grew up in a trailer park, I want to enjoy my incoming adult life going from town to town as a pro wrestler. Chase your dreams, give your past the finger. Unless your past was nice.

Edit: Hopefully someday you can find my hometown in the CAW menus on a WWE game because of me. That would be cool.

[Kill Em' All]

Albuquerque is one of the fastest growing cities in the United States, and as the years go by we feel that. And our crime rate is going through the roof. But I live in the suburb city of Rio Rancho, which is also experiencing a lot of growth. And is now the second biggest city in New Mexico. And we can feel the growth. Because the roads are clogging up and aren't meant for high levels of traffic. Our road system is fine, but they weren't made for us to be the biggest city. And the city is torn between trying to compete with ABQ or be the suburb. But, ABQ is kicking our ass. ABQ is growing into Big City dynamic and were getting a lot cool stuff going on our here. But depending on what Correctional facility I work for, I have feeling at some point in my adult life; I will move back into ABQ. ABQ is plagued with addiction, Horrible schools (New Mexico is 2nd lowest in education, Homicide, Huge for car theft, You can get with bad crowd or get yourself into trouble very quickly, etc. To be fair there is a lot of safe areas, and for the first part you got to put yourself in bad situation (Like wearing nice clothes and being on say Central and Wyoming at 1AM) or appear vulnerable. But even in safe areas, they're may be in homicide or two pop up. Crime is also spreading heavily to Mini Downtown area of the Westside, which use to be upstart area in the 00's. If I do move back, I most likely will live in the Heights near the mountains, or live in Los Ranchos which is on the banks of the River (Gotta make big dollars one day to do so).

Beautiful city with natural beauty and nothing is like being at our Baseball games during Summer sunset with friends and family. But, if I ever have children I will seriously debate raising them here.

[TurboEddie]

I’ve been living in the town I’m in for 20 years. It was fun growing up here. We had a lot to do as kids. Everything has since gone out of business, and the town just caters to seniors now. It feels like a retirement community. It’s the reason, I believe, I’m unable to live my best life and reach my full potential as a 30 year old man.

[rowdy1971]

My hometown is Chicago. Yeah, it needs to stop growing and start cleaning.

[shanieomaniac]

I live in CollegeTown PA basically. And it's frozen in time. The college changes the buildings from time to time, but rarely is anything new developed. But, nothing is really dying either. It's like the whole place is just stuck. It's frustrating. I lived in this town until age 18, then went to college for 8 years before coming home. When I came home, I realized that in those 8 years, the town remained exactly the same. No growth, no decline.

The only difference is the people. People, townies I mean, are far meaner than they were when I was a kid. The physical locale hasn't altered, but the attitude has. The once kind and helpful middle age individuals of my youth have become old and cruel senior citizens. I have no idea what happened, the same people live here! And the college students now believe they own the place, which was true as a kid too, but dang if the entire student population isn't obnoxious now. I was an undergrad for 8 years living in a party house and going to Rocky Horror, and I somehow still had manners.

All that said? I feel safe here. Hard Crime is low. Drugs are a problem (where aren't they), and there's plenty of shady stuff going on between the undergrads (both male and female. The assault rates for college students is insane). But you aren't likely to get shot or robbed. People might not say hello but they probably aren't going to mug you either. I can still to this day let packages sit on my stoop all day and nobody comes for them. I've had a package go missing once. The next day the neighbor showed up and said it was delivered to him by accident, and just handed it to me, still unopened.

So, I guess what I'm trying to say is that I left. I came back. Nothing changed, and in the end, neither had I. The town remains firmly in place, and I do as well.