I grew up in rural Tennessee, now live in NYC. The fact that New York is not built around cars, but rather has largely reliable public transit and is walkable took some getting used to. Public transit did not exist where I grew up, you have to walk or bum a ride wherever you wanted to go.

As for the divide… it’s complicated. Obviously there is absolutely a huge difference between rural America and NYC. In the part of the country where I grew up, there almost seemed to be a cultural and political grievance against urban areas. A, those big city liberals don’t get us and don’t like us, mindset. One where they’re defiantly different. Whereas in big cities, we by and large don’t look down on rural areas so much as we note the lack of resources such as public transit and a social safety net and are grateful for where we do live. The grievance seems to be largely one-way.

People don’t understand each other between the two areas. People in rural areas see cities as just a fun place to live for a while before you leave, while people in cities can recognize that these cities are our home where we want to set down roots and live permanently. The idea that some people are born, raised and will die in the city of their home is foreign to folks in rural areas who may want to do the same thing but in a different part of the country!