Small Town America

Growing up in a large city has left me without much comprehension for small town America, or small town Anywhere, for that matter. I don't have a great understanding of how people survive in a town that is smaller than the neighborhood in which I grew up. I can grasp how people make a living in small towns which have become tourist towns, but the others leave me drawing a blank for the most part. My sister has moved to one of these small towns. In fact, I quite honestly had no idea that towns this small existed. If I had simply driven through where she is now living, I would've never guessed it is a town, but just a random group of houses by a farmer's grain co-op. There are no stop lights, no stores, and not even that many houses. There's a lot of wide open space and big sky and farmland. There's a lot of quiet and black night and stars. There's a vast world of differences between there and here and completely different ways of thinking, reminding me how completely opposite cultures can be within one "culture." The changing of cultures isn't just challenging from one country to another, but can also be incredibly hard within the same country. Ideas are different, cultural norms are different, way of life is different, entertainment is different, clothing is different, topics of conversation are different. Perhaps we should all do a cultural exchange within our very own country so that we can understand others better. It's making me realize how it can affect all of our relationships with those around us, because we're misunderstanding each other's cultural backgrounds and ingrained habits and thought patterns. We're all so very different, aren't we?

Roggen, CO. What you can see is the town. There are some houses behind the grain co-op, but not many. This is where Abby and Jeremiah live.

Clear Lake, IA, where the IM home office is. This is more of what my idea of a small town was- about 8,000 people.

Silver Springs, CO. Another little town, but one that has become a tourist destination.