How Small Town Is That?

Ah, the long weekend is here. I hate the way all the radio announcers keep saying it’s the last weekend of summer. Can we not just extend the summer a bit longer? We are having a bit of a lazy long weekend, I must admit. That’s ok. Sometimes lazy is excellent. We did a bit more back-to-school shopping yesterday. There’s always something that’s strangely satisfying about putting the freshly sharpened pencils into a clean new pencil case. It’s ridiculously expensive to buy all of these school supplies for the kids – how can pencils and 33 cent duo-tangs and a few other things add up to 80 dollars? Sigh.
As you may know, I grew up in a very small town --so small that technically it was a village. So, here I am living in a “city” and over the span of 10 years, 2 of my neighbours have come from my hometown. And, another 2 neighbours used to work in the same office as my dad. Now, I know this could happen in the big city, but 4 neighbours? I think it’s great.
This time when I’m going to university, I have a bit more “big town” experience than when I went from high school. I moved from a village of, well, under 1000 to Toronto. I seriously did turn and look when cars honked along Yonge Street. I grew up without cable tv and studied broadcasting. How strange is that? So, in class we would talk about programs like “The Tonight Show” and I had no idea what they were talking about. Seriously. Not a clue. Needless to say that it didn’t take long for me to get the small town sign on my forehead. But, I didn’t mind because it was all true and I loved being from a small town. And even though I was surrounded by thousands of strangers, sometimes I would accidentally meet up with people from home. That always amazes me that out of a sea of unfamiliar faces, you can somehow manage to connect with a face that you know. And, maybe it’s not even someone that you have met before. Maybe it’s just another friendly person who knows the benefits of a smile.
Today we all walked to the market for a family activity. That’s always interesting – walking too slow, walking too fast, walking sideways into someone… you get the picture. Nevertheless, it was an attempt at a family outing. It’s great at the market – fresh food and you run into people that you know. My grandma used to bring eggs into this market every Saturday when she was young. I think it’s cool to be living in the same area and going to the very same market many years later. Connections. I like that and I suppose that’s part of what makes me “small town”.