Life in the Country is Different than Life in the City
By Jim Palmer Jr.

Today as I drove through the countryside north of Deer Park I came to a crossroads where there were two pickups stopped in the middle of the intersection with their windows rolled down. The drivers were smiling and engrossed in conversation. I waited patiently and smiled, happy to live in a rural area where people are friendly! When I relayed this story to the family I was visiting, I said, “It was at the big pine tree.” They knew exactly what I was talking about because everyone in this area knows where the big pine tree is at that intersection. Some of you city folks may be thinking that type of direction giving is hick talk, and that may be true, but that is one of the things I love about a rural lifestyle, and that speaks exactly to my subject line! 

There seems to be some sense of enmity between country bumpkins and city slickers as this labeling indicates! The culture of the city seems to be fast paced and stressful with a whiff of superiority in the air, while the rural lifestyle is slower paced, more relaxed, with the occasional whiff of something else in the air. When asked which of these two lifestyles or cultures are really superior only you can be the judge of that! I say they are just different from each other.

A city dweller may conclude that only ignorant hillbillies would want to live in the country and may look with disgust upon anyone living an austere rural lifestyle. Most rural dwellers are just happy for the sweet country life with lots of elbow room no matter what the living arrangements look like and don’t really understand why anyone would want to live in a city all scrunched up like that.

Many years ago I was asked by a broker to accompany her to a showing at a 10 acre parcel that was a fenced field. I was surprised when the female broker and the buyer got out of the car, both in high heels and short skirts. After tiptoeing around the field for a few minutes, the broker asked me “If they would be removing those horse turds”? My quick response was, “No!” but the thought inside my head was, “You might be better off in the city.”

If you yearn for a rural lifestyle, choose a broker who knows the difference between city life and country life!