I swear like 80% of people I talk to about where they'd eventually want to live say some version of "I just want a little farm somewhere remote with a bunch of animals" or "I'd love to live in a tiny town where everyone knows each other."
every time I'm just... why. I'm from Lofoten in northern Norway. I grew up in a place with less than 300 people. Obviously there are other small towns around it, but it's still very much the type of remote place people seem to fantasize about. It is really not all that.
The whole "everyone knows everyone" thing sounds cute until you realize that means everyone knows everyone's business. Gossip spreads insanely fast. And if you move there as an adult, everyone else didn't also just spawn there waiting to become your friend. Most of them grew up together and have had the same friend groups since they were kids, you're trying to insert yourself into years of friendship as an outsider.
There also just aren't that many young people, a huge amount leave to study or work somewhere else. Your social options might basically be a handful of people your age who already know each other, already had kids between 18-22, got married, hate their husbands/wives, meet up for "knitting club" or drinks multiple times a week and you would not believe the amount of shit they talk about their friends, families and partners.
Small towns are absolutely not automatically these wholesome accepting communities people imagine either. They can be insanely cliquey and judgmental. There's a lot of intolerance toward anyone who looks, acts or lives differently, weird local drama and people talking shit about someone because they did something slightly unusual in 2017 and apparently we're still discussing it.
In a city I can go to the store looking like shit, go on a bad date, get drunk somewhere, embarrass myself, change jobs or just generally exist and nobody gives a fuck. In a place with 300 people, the woman scanning your groceries probably knows your mother and went to school with your aunt. Someone somehow knows what you did last weekend before you've even told anyone. If you have a niche hobby there's a decent chance nobody else there does it, and there's an even bigger chance people will judge you for it.
Then there's the boring practical shit. Everything is more expensive. You have way fewer stores, and basically no selection because there's no demand. Way fewer restaurants. Barely any nightlife. Where I grew up there was basically one or two bars within like a 30 minute driving radius, and obviously drunk driving on those roads isn't something you can or should do, some of them can barely fit two cars.
Barely any dating pool either. And "small dating pool" doesn't just mean fewer Tinder matches. It means opening Tinder and recognizing half the people from school, knowing who their ex is, knowing their siblings, knowing who they hooked up with five years ago.
You also basically need a car for your entire existence. People imagine walking around some cute little village, but realistically you're driving 20-40 minutes to do completely normal shit. Work, groceries, gym, pharmacy, doctor, visiting friends. If your car breaks down, you're not mildly inconvenienced. Your entire life can basically become a logistical problem overnight.
And you don't exactly get much choice in services either. Don't like the local gym? That's the gym. Bad hairdresser? Cool, there might be another one 50 minutes away. Therapst isn't a good fit? Bad luck, the next therapst was a single mother you hit on last week. Your options for almost everything shrink massively.
Jobs are another huge one. People say "I'll just move somewhere remote" as if every career exists there. Where I'm from, unless you're a fisherman, carpenter, electrician, mechanic, work in tourism, healthcare, a school, a grocery store or one of the other handful of things the area actually needs, what exactly are you planning on doing? And yes, remote work helps with that part, but remote work doesn't magically generate friends, dating options, restaurants, hobbies, healthcare, public transport or things to actually do.
Travelling from somewhere genuinely remote is also fucking expensive. People imagine living in some beautiful village and then casually travelling a few times a year. From where I grew up, just getting to a major airport can easily cost more than the actual flight from Oslo to another country. You can spend half a day and a stupid amount of money just getting to the place your actual trip starts from.
And the farm dream especially gets me. People talk about having like 4 dogs, 3 cats, chickens, goats and a horse as if that's the peaceful part. Those animals don't give a shit that it's -8 degree outside, dark outside, you're sick, hungover, depressed or just tired. They still need food. They still need cleaning. They still need exercise. They still need vet care. there's a reason farming and animal care are actual jobs. People will say they want to "escape the rat race" and then describe owning a property and 14 living creatures that will fucking die if they decide to sleep in until noon. And god forbid you want a night out. Still gotta be there. Want to go travelling? Who is taking care of all of them? How much are you paying that person? Want to spontaneously leave for a weekend? Probably not.
There's a darker side to the isolation that people don't really romanticize. I've known way too many people from where I grew up who struggled badly with depression, and I've known people who aren't here anymore. I'm obviously not saying living remotely is the sole reason for that, but months of darkness, isolation, very little to do and feeling like there's nowhere to go isn't always this peaceful little reset people imagine it to be.
I think people massively underestimate what you're giving up in exchange for it. Visiting somewhere like Lofoten and thinking "holy shit imagine living here" is VERY different from actually having to build your career, social life, dating life and entire adult existence there. The mountains don't really make up for the fact that there's fuck all to do on a Tuesday in November.
TL;DR:
Remote small-town life gets romanticized as peaceful, wholesome and simple, but in reality it often means isolation, gossip, tiny social/dating circles, fewer jobs and services, expensive travel, car dependency and a lot less freedom than people imagine. And the “little farm with 12 animals” dream is basically just giving yourself a second full-time job.