Hi, I am Megan or as my good friends call me Meg or Megs.
Before I tell you about my adventures in small town living, I should tell you that before I moved to small town Montana, the smallest town I lived in had a population of 10,000 or so people. So when I moved from Minnesota to Montana it was a complete culture shock, add to that moving to a town of 700 people and it's a miracle I haven't gone completely off my rocker.
My adventures in small town living began when my husband Jason and I moved to small town, Montana in June 2011. Jason and I had graduated from Luther Seminary in St. Paul, Minnesota and were eager to start on our ministry adventures. In May I found out I was pregnant with our first child and everything was looking up in the world. We had visited the small town we currently reside in, at the end of April and after much discerning and discussion, decided that Jason should take the call to be the pastor of the Parish there. The Parish consists of two churches, the church in town and a church about 8 miles NE of town in the country. I thought I knew what we were getting into moving to a town of 700 people, but it turned out I had no clue.
The original plan when we moved was that I would substitute teach at the school until our baby was born and then I would stay home with him or her for a year, then go back to work. Well, none of that worked out as planned. I miscarried our first child in July 2011 and then after substitute teaching 2 times, I called it quits. I rarely was called in and when I was it was awful. So then I decided to try building my Mary Kay business which I had started back in Minnesota. Epic fail. I no longer sell Mary Kay. And I no longer had any way of bringing in some extra income. I started selling AVON instead, but with similar results. I'm giving myself until the end of the year to see if I can't build my business. If it doesn't work out, then I'm done.
But miracle of all miracles, I found out I was pregnant again on Thankgiving Day 2011. Seriously, one of the best days ever! So the job search took a halt because I still was planning to stay home with our kid for the first year of his or her life and there were no jobs in the nearest "big city" that made it worth driving there and back because the job would have paid for the gas to get me there and back. So needless to say, I have been jobless since June 2011, over two years, which has made me feel pretty worthless at times.
Now after 2 years and 5 months of living in small town Montana, I have this to say about small town living. It is definitely not for me. When I go out on walks with Jason and our 14 month old son Preston, we walk by the same houses, see the same sights and barely run into anyone outside. I find myself wondering if this is it. Is this really all that life has to offer here? I'm going to go crazy if I don't find an outlet for myself and my son. We spend a lot of time at home because there are no places for us to go for activities in town.
The people are nice here. Wonderful people. When we do move on from here, it will be really hard to say goodbye to some of the amazing people we have gotten to know.
People my own age here want nothing to do with me, I don't know if it's because they don't know how to act around a pastor's wife (act like you would around anyone else, hello....) or if it because I'm not from here or from around the area. I can't even claim I'm from some other part of Montana, which may have given me an in. Not only did I not grow up in this small town, which makes me an outsider, but I didn't grow up in Montana, which makes me even worse. I'm expected to pay my dues here to be accepted at some point down the road but I've gotten to the point where I don't give a crap. Sadly, that means I'm alone, with no friends my age close by to say, "Hey let's go out for lunch. I need a break from the house and my kid."
On the plus side, my friend Melissa, who is in a very similar situation to myself and who only lives about 2 hours away, and I have started going to a MOPS (mother's of preschool kids) group in Great Falls, which is a such a blessing. So there are silverlinings in this craptastical mess. Another silverlining is that it is beautiful here. I love the mountains and the landscape is just gorgeous. I think it would be hard for me to go back to living some place that didn't have mountains nearby.
We are a one income household. My husband makes enough for us to pay our student loans every month and for the essentials (food and other bills) but that's it. I've been told of a gym in Great Falls, the nearest "big city" to us, which is about 35 or so minutes away depending on where you need to get to. Sadly, we can't afford to join said gym or the extra gas it would take to drive there and back several times a week, where I would be able to work out and where they have daycare for kids while the parent works out. So we are basically stuck trying to figure out ways to not go crazy in our small town, except for the 1st and 3rd Thursday of each month, which is when MOPS group meets.
And I have discovered getting away from this small town as much as possible has helped. Because Montana is such a big state, it takes hours to get to some places. Even the drive to Great Falls means that we end up spending most of a day there doing errands, eating out and spending time together as a family. I've come to love our weekly Friday trips to Great Falls, even though I am not too impressed with Great Falls as a city itself. But nonetheless, it is an escape from my dull existence in the town we live in. We, as a family, also do a lot of driving to Montana ELCA Synod events, which gets us out of town. In fact, this weekend we are going up to Flathead Bible Camp for their annual meeting on Friday and Saturday. Next Friday, we are heading down to Helena for the Bishop's Conference, which will be an all day trip. So there are plenty of opportunities for us to go places as a family and get out of town. Even going to visit Jason's parents or his brother takes a few hours so we usually spend the night and have quality visiting time. :)
But Sunday-Thursday when my husband is working all day and most nights is when things get really tough with trying to keep a moving, easily bored kid occupied as well as myself. So I've come up with some ways to do that and some ways to keep myself occupied during nap times and once Preston has gone to sleep for the night.
I realize this post is pretty dismal, but after over two years of living like this and feeling alone a lot of the time, something's got to give. So I've started doing things I haven't done in a long time to keep busy while being cooped up in a town where there is nothing to do. Yes, much of my time is taken up with raising my loveable, amazing, sometimes pain in the ass son and being as supportive and good a wife as possible, despite being depressed about living where we live, but when I have alone time, which is when Preston is sleeping and Jason is working, I have found things to keep myself occupied.
One of these things is to participate in this blogging experiment with one of my best buds Virginia, where we plan to share with you some of our coping strategies and let all you out there in similar situations know that, you are not alone, and that we will survive, and be stronger for it in the end. Some of these strategies involve crafts, some involve nature, hiking and photography, some involve spending time in the kitchen and some involve hours wasted online pinning on pinterest (Don't judge. You do it too.) So here's to surviving small town living and the knowledge that this too shall pass, we just have to survive it first.
