Before I go on a rampage here, this post is more made from anger and is more of a rant style and I hope you love it.
I am from a very small town. Elizabethtown, Pennsylvania to be exact. Never heard of it? NO WAY. Neither has just about anybody else who’s not from here. It’s located in between Lancaster, home of the amish, and Harrisburg, our capitol. That’s right, I live twenty minutes from my states capitol, yet it feels as if I live in the middle of bum-fuck nowhere.
Now, don’t take me as somebody trashing their living arrangement or calling where they’re based bad or a terrible place. I do enjoy the farms and all the pretty trees and the day-time here. I say day-time only because I am terrified of the dark here as we have little-to-no light pollution. This should be a nice touch, but it’s not so much when you’re me, a twenty-year-old who is scared of the dark now more than she ever was when she was a child.
Small towns, while romanticized in films, I think suck the energy out of people who create. Generally we artistic folk are told we can’t do what we want to do and it’s discouraging, as it would be. People here expect every small town son and daughter to become a marketer or a doctor or to go into the army and while that may be the life some people want to lead, it’s not for everyone and it’s not for me. But, certain things are expected of us because how many famous poets, writers, artists and how much fame stems from people who were raised in a place that’s not California or New York City?
A lot of the time, any creative rutt I may get into comes from the lack of encouragement and the majority of un-feministic and non-activist people who live around me. Lots of people here and in many small towns are very much in a state of mind and routine that is, work, church and watching the TV while complaining that their political party is right and people on the TV they can’t seem to turn off are wrong.
It’s not romantic to live here, it’s exhausting. In movies, small towns are shown as busy and fun and full of nightlife and beautiful people. This is not the case.