A few weeks back now I started thinking about how I love living in our small town, Toowoomba. It’s not super small but small enough to not be big. (Does that make sense?)
It all started one afternoon at my daughter’s dance class. Usually parents drop the girls off or we sit outside in the sunshine during the class, but this particular day we were invited to come in and film the class so the girls could have a video of their routines to practice at home. I had come into the back of the class with a bunch of other mothers and was setting up Little Miss’ iPod to film when I overheard my name being mentioned quietly by another mum in the group. Now Little Miss has only been in the class this year so I don’t know many of the other mothers yet, but it seemed a friendly enough group. Sure enough when I glanced their way I got a huge smile from a lady I had noticed around the place, and she immediately came over to talk to me. The conversation went something like this:
New Friend: “Hi! You’re Tonya, aren’t you?”
Me: “Yes. Hi!”
New Friend: “I work with your friend, B, and she mentioned you were in this class so I’ve been looking out for you to say hello.”
Now you might already know and love my friend, B – she writes over at BBeingCool and is one of my favourite peeps in the world! So I figure any friend of hers has got to be lovely too and I had a getting-to-know-you conversation with my New Friend – in whispers, of course, since there was a dance class happening!
It got me thinking about how much I love living here compared to living in Brisbane, where I grew up. It is a lovely town with pretty parks, plenty of schools to choose from for the kids, not too much traffic, and close enough to visit our family in a day when we want to. We chose to live here after being here temporarily for a couple of years and moving away again, and we have never regretted that decision. It feels like home to us. We wouldn’t choose to live a bigger city permanently now I don’t think.
Top 3 Reasons I Love Living in a Smaller Town
1. Mutual Friends
That is not the first time I have met someone only to find that we have mutual friends. In fact, it is rare for me to find a new friend who doesn’t already have some connection to people I already know here. I love that! When I want to meet up with people, I can safely invite friends from a bunch of groups and know that there will be some connections to make things comfortable. (Yes, every now and again there is some negative connection, but it is rare so I must be very lucky to have nice friends!)
2. Running into people at the shop
Working from home can be a lonely thing, so I love that when I pop out to the shops, I have about a 75% chance of running into a friend. The number of great conversations I have had in the grocery aisles or outside the post office is huge. When I’m lucky, these chance meetings turn into a quick coffee or a bite to eat together, but they always mean an update on how my friend is going with life and a chance to encourage each other. One of peeps talks about “doing life together” and small towns make that easier I think.
3. Small enough to shop everywhere in one morning
Another bonus of a smaller town is being able to get everywhere within 10-15 minutes, which translates to being able to shop everywhere in one day – if you need to! That could be looking for the perfect dress for some occasion that I’ve left to the last-minute, but usually for me it means searching for the perfect fabric that I need for a project. There may be only 5 or 6 options for fabric shopping (if that?) but I can visit them all in a day if I need to and still be on time to pick up the kids from school.
Who could ask for more?!
I love living in Toowoomba too – and love becoming friends with you through B also! As much as I love getting a big city hit every now and again, I’d much prefer to be raising a family in our smaller town!