Yes! Go Badgers!
No and I wouldn’t live there now if I could (housing project in the South Bronx). The town I do live in has many people like the OP. I remember going to my first Open House at the middle school and my son’s English teacher looked around the room, then picked up his pointer and said: “I had you, and you and you and you and you…”
H’s mom still lives in the house he grew up in another borough of NYC. I would love to sell my current house and live in that house. The area is still nice, the taxes are much lower and it’s a shorter, cheaper commute to work, on the same train line I use now. The amount I’d have to pay in city resident income taxes is much less than the property taxed I currently pay, so it would be a win win.
No. H and I grew up in small midwestern towns about 10 miles apart. The towns were solidly middle class 50 years ago, but have gone steadily downhill economically. We are now too used to the amenities of living in the suburbs of a large city to ever go back.
No and no. I remember knowing in high school that I would choose to live elsewhere when I got the chance. But I find it interesting to see on Facebook how many of my high school classmates returned there after college or never left.
In my current city, many people are from here originally and some even bought their parents’ houses or live only a short distance from where they grew up. There is a private high school near by that is full of kids whose parents also went there. It seems a bit insular to those of us who aren’t from here.
The majority of my HS classmates who completed college did not go back. Most of the people I knew from HS who stayed did not attend college or only the local cc. Same for H’s friends.
No and no. I grew up in Connecticut. My father took the train into NYC every day for 30 years. In high school all my friends would say they couldn’t wait to get out of that town and live somewhere else and I would think why? I like it here. But I left at 19 and never went back. I lived for 20 years in Boston/Cambridge and then moved to a Midwestern city which I have grown to love. Interestingly, both kids grew up here and have settled into lives and careers here.
Maybe. I think about it all the time. The place I grew up (til mid hs) was very Saroyan-esque, kids and dogs running free, biking into town, lots of historical sites, and more. But that was then. There’s a diff between memories and today.
Would I move to the DC suburb where I grad’d hs and my family stayed a few more years? I think about it. But it’s financially nuts and much more crowded. Two great places.
In total I have lived here 40 years. Mr. Ellebud has lived here for 25 years.
No and no. I grew up on the jersey shore. I still have some family there. Too crowded, too expensive and just not for me. I never had that jersey sensibility. Though I did enjoy the not filling your own gas thing.
Bevhills, I’d move there, lived near enough and liked it. But I no longer have a purpose in that West LA/SM area. I think it makes a difference when one still has enjoyable contacts. And when I was there, some aspects were still ‘sleepy.’ Westwood, eg. Otoh, I did encourage D1 to consider it. (She still lives in her hometown.) She may get as far as Austin.
No and no. Grew up in two places (we moved as I was going into hs); both were working class areas in large midwestern cities. Went to college in the midwest and never returned. Last year, I attended a 45th hs reunion and was surprised that out of the 175 folks at the reunion–2 of us lived in the northeast. Vast majority stayed in the same city or lived in surrounding states in the midwest. A few moved to FL and AZ.
Ok…I’m not writing on a phone! So I can explain.
I grew up on Ohio, but I got my first job in northern New England out of college. To be honest, I like the semirural areas where I’ve lived here a LOT more than suburban areas in Ohio where I lived.
And NO I don’t wish I lived in Ohio. I visit three times a year for about a week…and that is quite enough.
My DH grew up in a number of countries in South East Asia. It has never been an option to move or live in any of them…and we wouldn’t want to anyway.
Yes - came back to be nearer to my parents as they aged and needed help with yardwork, snow. Wanted to move away in HS and irony is ended up right back in same school district with my kids who couldn’t wait to leave…and so on and so on… trying to break the cycle in retirement - but this town is like Hotel California. You can ck out but you can never leave!
I too remember when Westwood was a sleepy town. Heck I remember when BH had a lot of small local businesses. I do remember when everybody was talking about the “new” store, Goh chee (Gucci) and only locals could say Air mess) and Charleville (Char lee ville NOT Charley ville.
Were we a pias? Oh yeah.
Asked Mr R if he wanted to live in his hometown. He said no. He is from a small-ish town on the other side of Michigan. There are quite literally no jobs there. Old factory town where the factories left well over a generation ago. High rates of unemployment, alcoholism, suicides, etc. So sad.
I wouldn’t live in my birth through middle school hometown. Drugs and crime are rampant and jobs are nonexistent. It’s only about a 10 minute drive from where I live now but it is a world away. I just recently heard that they completely eliminated their school buses because the district can’t afford them. 
No and no.
My husband and I grew up in adjacent communities in Connecticut. Life took us to upstate New York, three locations in New Jersey, and then Maryland. We’re now at the age where we’re starting to think about whether we will stay put when we retire or move to another part of the country. Connecticut is not on the list of places we would move to. It’s too snowy and too expensive, and we no longer find New England appealing. I know it’s supposed to be quaint and scenic, but to us – after almost 20 years in Maryland – it seems old, cramped, and dirty.
No and no, and same for W.
I grew up in a dying industrial town in upstate NY. W grew up in northern NJ. We lived near my hometown for a while, moved 3000 miles to the Seattle area. I (half) joke that I was the last one from the top 10% of my graduating class to leave. There is just so much more available out here.
W’s parents followed us a few years ago. My parents retired in the foothills of the Sierras in CA. Those dying NE towns are just so depressing, no reason to stay once the job ends.
No, sort of almost part-time, and wouldn’t mind though like the sort of better. I have never lived in my hometown again after graduating high school. My parents broke up shortly thereafter and there was too much drama going on at the time. The rest of our relatives lived about 30 minutes away. We live overseas most of the year, but spend every summer about 30 minutes in a different direction from the relatives and where my own family grew up, and maybe an hour north of where my husband grew up, in a modest home that we have been building for about 10 years or so. So we plan to settle at some point in the future not far from where I grew up.
No. Nor in hubby’s. And do not wish to live in either one. No regrets.
No and no. Very happy to have raised kids in the region where we attended college, No interest in either hometown, then or now.
One set of parents moved to be near us 12 years ago; that made great sense. Our kids grew up in a town not unlike where either of us were raised, yet in a third state. It was largely the schools, coupled with career access that put each location on the radar of the family choosing it.