Dear World: I Can’t Stop Thinking About How Different Life is in the Country Than in the City

A must-read for anyone dreaming about life in the country

I’m Ash, and I’m a writer, traveler, nonconformist & nomad, and every week I’m sharing funny field notes from around the world. Currently, I’m in America writing about what it’s been like to return home to my small town, twenty years after living abroad.

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You know how sometimes you just CAN’T STOP THINKING about things?

I can’t stop thinking about how different life is in the country than it is in the city.

For example, in the country, everything smells like manure. In the city, everything smells like manure, but there’s an Orange Julius nearby. (Do we even like Orange Julius??? Isn’t it so 1998??? I feel like this was en vogue right around the same time that the Delia’s catalogue was, and that was right around the same time they came out with baby tees and gave an entire population of girls life-long anxiety. Ladies, I hope you enjoyed your 15 years of having a normal body!)

Living in the country is like living on another planet. It’s a whole other human experience. The skills you need here are *so different* from the ones you need in the city. For example, I used to be able to parallel park, now I need to know how to kill a bear with a shoelace.

But, seriously: it’s about so much more than petty things like learning how to say “please” and “thank you” while wearing a sweater covered in pumpkins. It’s—weirdly and surprisingly—about personal growth. I remember how I used to think that personal growth could only come from going B-I-G-G-E-R. Remember when that was how it seemed? A bigger city, a bigger career, a bigger salary, a bigger house, a bigger life—at least, on paper.

Big equaled good.

Big equaled success.

Going big meant that you were big.

And then one day you look around and realize that even the biggest of accomplishments isn’t fulfilling if you aren’t.

Here is a list of surprising things that have fulfilled me this past year:

1. Learning how to slay power tools.
   I LOVE showing people my “creeper room.” That’s what I call the room where I keep all the tools in the garage. Inside the creeper room, I’ve got my chainsaw, my saws-all, my jig saw, my tile saw, my circular saw, my oscillating saw, and my wood planer. I’ve also got a regular drill, an impact gun, a brad nailer, a pressure washer, an airless paint sprayer, a hedge trimmer, a weed wacker, and a lawn mower—one that runs on batteries and is the cutest thing since Johnny 5!
   
   (Side note: the jigsaw is my favorite of all the saws. You can cut things out! Like a jack-o-lantern for wood. I replaced my own countertop and cut out the sink hole using the jigsaw. I put down tongue & groove flooring using the jigsaw. I could make an entire empire just around the jigsaw. I shall be the world’s first jigsaw influencer.)
   

2. Learning how to catch mice. (Stay with me on this.)
   I KNOW, THIS IS WEIRD. But if you’ll recall, last year I was absolutely terrified of mice. Like, horrified. Everyone’s all like “oh, part of living in the country!” like some kind of demented optimist. And here’s me like, “you mean they might get IN THE HOUSE???????????” Wrote a whole post about my meeting with the bug guy, and the first time I saw a dead mouse, and the haunting realization that these things are in the walls. It was almost enough to get me to leave—sort of like when Adam and Barbara try to scare Delia Deetz out of their house in Beetlejuice. (And that is the second time the name Delia comes up in one post?!)
   
   I want you to know: a year later, and I am FIERCE. (Mostly.) Even though there’s a flesh-eating chipmunk in the crawl space upstairs, I have not stroked out. Even though the flesh-eating chipmunk (or mouse or squirrel or furry rodent that’s really trying to fuck with my sleep patterns) loves to gnaw on spray foam and make this really loud scratchy goblin sound, and loves to prance around on the floorboards in the middle of the night like a gorilla, I have still slept. And then you know what I did? I went to the store, and I bought some traps, and I put them in the crawl space, and I caught the mouse. Which, to be fair, is probably only one of seven-hundred, but I caught one! And, as much as I don’t take pleasure in this, its ‘better than having mouse urine on my sandwich.
   

3. Learning how to (really) ride an ATV.
   Sounds basic. But so not basic! Riding a four-wheeler isn’t just about setting it on automatic and cruising along; it’s also about doing donuts when you enter the driveway. I KID, I KID. But no, really: what I was going to say is that it’s also provoked a weird type of personal growth where you stop being afraid of everything. Four wheelers, by definition, are about going off-road. And somehow, there’s a parallel with taking your life off-road. There’s a power in that. There’s power in saying “fuck it” and driving through the mud. There’s power in not worrying about your boots, or your pants, or your jacket. There’s power in knowing how to maneuver yourself across the county. There’s power in going off on your own for a solo adventure. And, there’s even power in figuring out how the hell to get yourself out of sticky situations: like when you think you can cross a creek but the creek is actually mud and you actually bury the entire machine up to its ass and can’t get it out. (WHOOPS.) You learn how to be resourceful; learn what needs to be done; learn who to call, learn what is needed. (Turns out, winches and tow straps are the linchpins of country living. Do you know what a winch is??? It’s MAGIC. It’s this little device that attaches to the ATV and, say, a tree and then uses a cable and a motor to pull your ass out. Same technology as the Roomba.)
   

4. Learning how to express yourself in a new language.
   Rugs are a sentence. Artwork is a sentence. Lighting is a sentence. Furniture is a sentence. Your tiny little teacups are a sentence. And it all comes together to tell a story about who you are.
   
   Turns out? I like telling stories. (Who knew.) And now I like telling visual stories. (Even though that phrase has always annoyed me.) There is something fascinating about being able to get to know yourself from a new angle. Which decisions will you make? What are you drawn to? Why are you drawn to it? What do you like? Do you know how many times we, as people, don’t even know what we like??? Giving yourself an empty space is like giving yourself a prompt for your soul: here, here’s an exercise. Use it to understand more about who you are.
   
   (So far I have learned that I’m an 86-year-old granny from England.)
   

5. Learning how to be independent in an all-new way.
   In every city I’ve lived around the world, they all have one thing in common: other people to do the job. I have used apps to hire men on-demand to help me move a heavy box up the stairs. I have had Christmas trees delivered, hauled up three flights of stairs, set up into a stand, and taken away when it’s done. I have had boxes of ingredients delivered to my house, each meal perfectly measured and ready to cook—complete with instructions. (Thank god.) I have had people to help clean, power wash, mow, drill. I’ve had brand-new cars delivered. I’ve had curtains hung. I’ve had closets designed. Hell, I’ve bought entire houses sight unseen on the internet.
   
   But one thing about living in the country is you’re expected to know how to do things yourself. There is no other way. I can’t even get a pizza delivered here—and that’s no shit.
   
   So with every task that seems complex, or intimidating, or over my head, I take it as an invitation to become dangerous. To become lethal with knowledge. To gain confidence in a new area. To get stronger in places where I was once weak. To get smarter and know that much more about the world we live in.

One thing I noticed as I was writing these: they all start with the word “learn.” That wasn’t intentional, but it’s reflective of my experience here. Every day is a new lesson. It feels a little bit like being a kid again, when everything is new and you don’t know how to do any of it—and that’s what makes it great.

This is why travel is great.
And, turns out? This is why being in one place can be great, too.

Every place you go offers you an opportunity to show up in new ways. You don’t have to go to the biggest brightest city. You don’t have to chase the biggest, brightest lights. You don’t have to be the biggest, brightest star.

Sometimes, leading a big life will actually look like you’re leading a small one.

So long as there isn’t a baby tee involved.