How to live on $432 a month in America

I've often felt this way about some of today's complaints. I grew up in area like what was mentioned in this article and I long for the day I can go back there. I would in a heartbeat if my partner shared the same mentality as me.

I don't really see a point in living a big city with the remote job I have and that many others have if I can live in a smaller area that still has humans but much cheaper way of living. Everyone claims it's about living in a city with available services but I see those same people decry how much the food costs and also that they have no friends and can't find someone to date. My thoughts aren't as articulate as I'd like them to be but I guess I'm ultimately trying to say is if I'm going to be miserable, why not do it on my own land for a lot cheaper.

I've lived most of my life in (or outside of) small towns, and some of it in a city. I've noticed that my small-town friends who moved to the city would often talk about all the culture and food choices, but when it comes right down to it, they mostly eat at chain restaurants and go to the movies, same as they could in a smallish town. They might occasionally go to a pro baseball game or the zoo or something that's only available in the city, but country people can make a day trip to do that too.

I'm sure some city people do take advantage of all the diverse options the city gives them, but it seems like a lot of them ended up there for other reasons and then use that as a rationalization for staying where everything costs so much more.

I recently visited New York City for the first time and honestly wasn't impressed. Outside of a few neat things like visiting the cronut place, I could do nearly everything the same back home.

The bagel places were indeed good, but not noticeably different than the hipster bagel places in my city.

Wood fired pizza was good at several places, but again...none were noticeably different than the wood fired oven fancy places in my small city.

The game stores are much bigger in my city due to lower real estate prices.

Times Square was the biggest disappointment. It's literally just standard big box store crap like GAP and M&M store and stuff like that. I guess that one's on me as it's a tourist trap.

Central Park was cool, but not as good as the multiple large parks in easy driving distance.

I could go on and on like that, but essentially I can own a home for a fraction of the cost to rent there. The only real difference is in a metropolis like NYC, you can meet up with people for any interest you want practically. You want to learn Klingon? I'm sure there's people doing that in NYC, but not like a city of 150,000.

Edit: the tap water was superior to my towns.

NYC lives on the fumes of its former reputation. Corporate chains have changed the city into basically a shopping mall.

When I was a kid I was drawn to NYC by the little hole in the wall restaurants, delis, coffee shops, funky stores. All owned and frequented by colorful local people. Technically these things still exist but they're mostly corporate chain versions of what used to be there. The unique experiences that the city still has to offer are too expensive and exclusive to be accessible.

Ironically, if I want unique food or local weirdness nowadays, I can find more of it in my lame hometown than I can in most cities.