I was just about to post this. Thanks for the shout-out. I wish I worked in a job that allowed for this. More and more, the appeal of small town, solitude makes sense to me.
I think about it more and more as time goes on. Being in Maryland is really nice because there's so much isolated space, but nothing is very far so I could still commute if I Ineeded to. But the appeal of the Midwest calls to me for some reason. Being that far from everything sounds so wonderful.
I've considered living in a small town, but... I worry about my ability to make friends with people there. I'm a really weird person, and only seem to be able to find people who are weird in the same ways if I have a really huge population of people to select from. (Or if the town is selected for people who are like me, I guess.) I have this association with small towns of like... gossip and exclusion if you don't conform to what everyone else is like there.
Do you think you're more normal than me, or is it not as bad as I think?
Well, small towns are a bit of a double edged sword. You're going to have your gossip and you're going to have your cliques, but they're not like you expect. It's more that everyone knows what's going on. The nice thing about it is, it really makes people think twice about how they want to behave and present themselves. No one wants to be the town asshole. As a result, people's behavior is a 50/50 mix of being genuinely nice and being forced to be nice, but it kind of works.
You don't have to really worry about being weird though, unless you're really out there. Everyone has their eccentricities. The thing is though, everyone is also too busy being caught up in their own personal lives to really care. So while you might not blend in, you probably won't be ostracized either. If you're really concerned about how you'll come across to people, you can always slowly introduce yourself over time. You don't have to go to every football game or be at the bar every Saturday night. If you wanna stay at home and relax on the back porch, no one's really going to think twice about it.
I'm not just talking about people being mean, though. I can be cordial with just about anyone. It's a matter of having enough commonalities to forge real friendships.
I live in a mid sized city of under 1 Million, but over 500K. The pros are that housing is affordable, if you are skilled labor you have a job, the communities in town are small and intimate (3400 IT professionals for example), there is a church for every sort of denomination from Catholic to Muslim to Jewish to Unitarian to nones. And being a city, there is stuff to buy, shops to shop at, and restaurants to eat at.
The bad thing is that if you did not grow up here, you are always an outsider; but if you have skills you will always be welcome. Housing is affordable, but does not appreciate in value either (My house is the exact same appraisal as when I bought it ten years ago), Communities are small which means that everyone in your community (job, school, church, etc) will know your business. There are some things and some hobbies that flat out don't exist here and that is why we have the internet. This is a red state and the education system reflects that; people don't seem excited about the world, they are not curious, they don't read, etc. If you don't watch TV, you will miss roughly 1/2 of every conversation. And sometimes when you want that 24 hour computer store to pick up a part to finish a project, well, that won't happen. Oh, yea, the Internet out here sucks. As in no investment in infrastructure, poor speeds, drops and time outs.. and it is expensive.
All in all I am glad that I am here, the people are nice, the cost of living is fantastic, and I get paid roughly 3x median, which although not 1% money can stretch quite a bit due to low housing, transportation and food costs. This is about as small a place as I could comfortably live. I'm debating now if i want to move closer into the city or stay where I am as this place is nearly paid off. Where I live now feels like the middle of nowheres'ville yet I am less than 25 minutes in traffic from downtown.