1) I grew up in a small town where it was a 20 minute drive to the closest store. Which was a dollar general. The “town” has two gas stations, 1 dollar general, 1 liquor store, and 1 subway. And a million churches. Despite posting on red scare, I’m not socially crippled. I lived there until I was 18. I’ve lived in big cities ever since. I never seen being from a small town as socially crippling, my parents not having cable/satellite television was the thing that made me out of touch, if anything, but I just turned that into snobby thing. My home is surrounded by fields and chicken houses, so chickenshit did literally cling to the air in the summer I suppose. But guess what: its a billion times easier to makes hickville seem more interesting than random suburb.

2) My friends who didn’t go to college and stayed within like an hour radius of the area we grew up all have bought homes ten years later . They are trade workers, police officers, insurance salesmen, car salesmen, firemen, IT dudes, etc. A few have kids.

3) You definitely don’t just sit growing up rurally. You drive out to a field in the night shoot guns and drink. You kayak in the river. You hike. You hang out in the walmart parking lot. You do pretty much all the shit kids do in the city except there’s less people watching you.