Let me take a minute to describe this awful city that I live in. Upon first glance, it is charming and full of history. School children wait all year for their big trip to my front door--almost literally as I live within a few blocks of a large mall where tour buses park to let their riders terrorize my neighborhood and eat at the food court. Families plan vacations here. Foreigners make this their first stop.
However, despite being a gaudy lure for vacationers, the city I live in has very little to offer her inhabitants beyond high prices and traffic jams. The people here are very transient. This is a town full of ambitious yuppies looking to get in a few good working years and then move back to their real homes to make piles of money. The demographic is decidedly young, which being young myself, should be a good thing, but it is not. There are very few families. Even fewer children. When I go back to my cornfield I am shocked, amazed, and ridiculously annoyed by teenagers and their bad driving and rude behavior, and completely turned off by bratty 10 years olds pushing around their younger siblings in the popular chain restaurants. We don't get that here. This is mainly a city of adults. Snooty adults.
The people here are on a mission, and can't be bothered. Working a 12 hour day is the norm, and most lives consist of very little other than work, eat and sleep. Thus, people are exceedingly unfriendly. No one is interested in making friends, and even if they were, there wouldn't be time to do so. Or at least no one would admit to having time to do so, as free time is a sign of weakness, as ridiculous as that sounds. People here take a sick pride in how stressed out and haggard they are. The fewer hours of sleep they get, the more important they think they are. Everyone is looking out for themselves and their interests only. People don't smile when they pass you. They don't say hello in the hallway. No one asks about your personal life because no one really has one to speak of. This is a very lonely and isolated city.
I have noticed a distinct change in me since moving out here. I used to be funny and outgoing, willing to bring up small talk in line at the grocery store, or hold the door open for a line of strangers. Now I am withdrawn and introverted. I have lost my sense of humor even to the point where my boss has to tell me to lighten up. I don't smile much and I laugh even less. I can count on one finger how many friends I have. I would need several extra hands to count the number of people I know who are in the exact same miserable position, but have forgotten how to fix it. My passion for life has been sucked away and replaced by a drive to....well, I want to say "survive" but that's just a little to rhymey for my tastes.
I'll close this up with an example from today of the sheer unfriendliness and unwillingness to engage another person that is so common in this city. For the record, I have seen this happen more than is natural, and I myself have done it as well.
The scene: two people are on a narrow sidewalk lined on either side by bushes. It's a beautiful day and neither person appears to be rushed. The two approach each other. Both have their heads up, backs straight and noses held firmly in the air. They can see that there won't be room for both to pass at the same time. Instead of one person politely smiling and stepping aside with (heaven forbid!) a smile and a hello, both people speed up and literally run themselves into the bushes, scattering pine needles and mulch instead of being courteous. The whole time neither party makes eye contact, as that would be like admitting you have seen the other person and are willing to acknowledge their existence. Neither can be bothered to be friendly.
And that is what it is like here. We would rather rub elbows with the landscaping than try to be real human beings.
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