did you leave town? or did you stay?

Stayed in my home town until my mid-late 20s. I'm glad I left, but I miss it, and if I had to move back there I wouldn't mind. It's a proper city, though, and I made my own life there rather than being dependent on school friends.

I live less than a ten minute walk from the flat I grew up in and work a five minute walk from the university I went to. I have never spent more than two months away from London at a time. I would be open to leaving though. I did briefly consider moving to Hong Kong at one point and have recently been looking at jobs based overseas. As much as I love all the things London has to offer, I could see my quality of life being better somewhere else.

Never had a home town cos of multiple moves tbh, but i'd happily settle on achill for a life of contemplation and simple living if theyd sort out the internet

*wonders about wireless on the baja peninsula*

I got the hell out and I'm staying out. My family's home is an island of relative sanity where even though I argue with everyone, they have to put up with me anyway. No one else in the fucking place can stop being racist/sexist/religious for long enough to stop picking their teeth with their toenails. It's actually very pretty there, which makes the people all JOLLY and proud instead of looking as crabbed and mean as they really are.

It's very beautiful where I'm from and my immediate family is the worst part about it, although everyone else is worthy of contempt. I live in the city here where it has felt like too close to home, but I'm discovering that it's further away than I give it credit for.

gave

Not very good at the leaving home thing tbh. Stayed in my small uncool market town until 27, long after everyone I knew and 99% of anyone my age had left, and now I live in a suburb of the nearest city - the nearest suburb to the town I left

(and one which more or less is just another small uncool market town except with more frequent buses and a just-about-walkable distance to the city centre, which I go to even less often than I did before I lived here. some people in this city go to London multiple nights a week for the nightlife, but to me London is another planet entirely)

I mainly live like this because it's the easy way out and I'm lazy, but I could stand to be less afraid of the unknown, it's true.

I've ended up living about half a mile from where I was born, which was never really an intention, but life's panned out that way. Grew u about ten miles away in a seaside town, left for university, came back intending not to be at home more than about three months, met a girl, got a job at the university, and slowly a girlfriend became a wife and a job became a career, and ,y wife started a career at the same place, too. We're lucky that where we live and work has been on an upward curve for the last decade, and we've ridden that: we've not suffered because of the recession at all (in fact we made a small profit on our flat which we brought in 07 at the 'height' of the market). Neither of us intended staying in this part of the world, but it's beautiful, the city, though small, is a great place to live, and we've got a lot of friends here now. A lot of my friends moved to London or Bristol or further afield; I doubt they're any happy that's we are. Some of them are desperate to come back!

My home town felt pretty toxic for me as a teenager, I'd alienated all the friends I had in my neighbourhood by going to public school, and the few friends I had at school all lived elsewhere anyway. I used university as a way to move away, although the town I ended up going to university in was pretty rubbish as well. Eventually a friend and I moved to London in 2001 and I've been there since. Unfortunately all the friends I had in London have since moved away (couldn't afford/didn't want to bring up kids in London, or for work etc). Most of the negativity I had for my home town has gone now, but I can't really see myself moving back there.

Left but not soon enough.

My favorite song ever on the subject. (Because I want it to be--I don't even think it actually is.)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nmWW8pZS7ys

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nmWW8pZS7ys

w the exception of my first year of college, I have lived in san antonio my whole life.

i left town directly after high school, and then a year later my parents moved to another city, and then moved again. so i haven't had a "home" in a long time (boo hoo, poor me, waah). i keep moving every 3-4 years to a new city, so i wherever i am never feels like home either.

When I came back after college and living on my own, I had the attitude that I would only be home for a little while before moving on again.

That was 18 years ago.

I'm starting to feel like a yo-yo, and my home town is the hand. Age 18, left town, 4 years away, came back for 3 years. Went away for 3 years. Came back, been here ever since (11 years at the end of this April).

We'd moved house 16 times by the time i was 16, i moved out at 17, what is 'home' pls

left the first chance i got - 21 years ago. closing in on the point where I'll have lived where I live now longer than I lived in that very stupid and dumb town. my parents still live there. it is still crappy.

Most of the crappy people who were here while I was growing up left while I was away, so it's considerably less crappy here now. Or maybe just the same number of crappy people, just a different set who I'll never have much occasion to be in contact with.