Just a small town girl

Greatest Hits / Journey











She never wanted to live in a small town. She had been there, done that, bought the t-shirt and felt no need to revisit. When she’d accepted the job, she knew the town population was about 5000, but that held no meaning. In sum she gave it no thought.



By the time it hit her that she was going to be well immersed in small town life, regardless of the fact that she did not live in town, it was too late. She already knew people by name. She knew maiden names, relatives and friendship networks. She knew without being told when some one said “She” in particular context exactly who was being referred to.


At first it wasn’t so bad. In fact, in many ways it was homey. Of course, there was a down side too. Such as when she arrived at the post office to be asked about her cold that she had recovered from four days previous. Another well meaning person had asked why her car was parked in the lot so late at night. And on a third occasion, she was actually called with the request of if she would mind dropping something off on her way home from work.


She had, oddly not minded these things, though they were intrusions into what she considered her personal life. What she minded was presumption. And the presumptions about town frequently made no sense. Some times people would presume she knew information that she was not responsible for. Yet other times, they presumed she knew nothing about things that were solely hers to decided. She supposed it was a positive thing when people forgot she was not a ‘native’ and presumed she knew local history, but it was hard.


What she really minded was she had no idea how to deal with these issues. And on some days it drove her crazy.