Connectedness. There is something fundamentally different about a small town where many of the residents work in or around the town. There is a connectedness that you don't find in small towns that are bedroom communities I am sure some bright young sociologist has already mapped this out, but I have discovered a phenomenon in Floyd that I have not experienced elsewhere and I want to jot down my observations before they fade away and lose their freshness.
I am sure there are other places like Floyd, but I have not seen
them. I have lived in several small towns, some of them as small as
Floyd, but they were mainly bedroom communities for commuters.
In these towns, neighborhood relationships were mostly created by
mothers with young school-aged children or by employees of companies in
the same industry. The networks were fragmentary and most families were
essentially isolated, even from their immediate neighbors.
I lived in many small communities where I didn't know the names of the neighbors I could see from my front steps.
Our lives were severely compartmentalized. Neighbors would get
divorced and move away and the remaining neighbors would not know where
they had gone or what happened.
In Floyd, on the other hand, it seems like everyone is connected in
some way and the effect is multiplied because many people work several
jobs. We discovered this early on when our mailman introduced himself
as our County Supervisor. By the time we got to town the next day to
go shopping, several people knew who we were and where we lived. … [Making Ripples: post-corporate adventures]