Hometown Culture

Looking back on my first 19 years, I don't feel that there are any exact instances that I can pinpoint as factors that shaped me into the person I am today. For the most part, I feel I've lived a fairly average life with not very many experiences that separate me from any other average person. I lived in a 4 bedroom home in Little Canada, Minnesota with my mom, dad, and sister. We would eat dinner together every night as a family and always had our normal basketball or dance practice to attend to. The schedule went wake up, school, homework, dinner, practice, bed. Everyday, with little variation. It seems routine to think about now, but never seemed to get old back then.

Little Canada has a population of around 10,000. Its not too big, and there is a good chance that you will run into at least one person you know in town every day. It doesn't seem to be have the culture of your cliche small town until you leave the scene for a while and observe from an outside perspective. Growing up in Little Canada never seemed to be any different than growing up in any other small suburb until I left for college. It is expected that when you go to college you will make many new friends and move on from others. This holds true for most, however, if you grew up in the Little Canada area or attended the local high school, there is a very good chance that you will never fully escape the scene that you came from.
The fact that LC has a very distinct culture of its own became very apparent after my first year of college. There is a lingo that would be mistaken for a foreign language to any outsider and the same group of people every weekend at the small, local bar. The "culture" of it in itself is hard to explain, but if it's a part of you it is clear to see that it exists with quite a distinction from others. All outsiders are welcome but not all feel comfortable because they don't quite understand the culture of this town.

It took one year living away from my home town (which is a whole 20 minutes from campus) to realize that no matter how much time I spend away, the Little Canada culture has shaped who I am and will always be a part of me. The families that make up this community will always be considered family to me, and the ways of this town that make it different from all others will always be the ways that I know.