The Hometown Game

If you ever move to a small area there's one thing you've have to deal with, especially if there aren't a lot of new people moving in.

If you meet someone local they want to know all your relatives and back a couple of generations too. At least that's how it is around here. That can be taken to extremes.

One time I met a guy while primitive camping on a wilderness lake. We discovered we were both from the same town. Eventually we figured out we were fifth cousins. How is that even sane? Who counts fifth cousins?

There are a few more new people coming into the area and the local desire to know all your relatives and relationships can drive them crazy. One of my new out of town friends tried to introduce me to someone last night. Little did my new friend know that she was trying to introduce me to my third cousin on my mother's side.

Actually, for me that was a problem growing up as I didn't want to date my cousins. Good thing I got my driver's license as soon as I turned 16 and my own car at 17. That allowed me to date girls from other towns. My lovely wife is from another state.

Moving to a small town has a lot to recommend it, but at some level you will always be an outsider. Your kids, not so much. Your grandkids will probably be accepted as local. That doesn't mean you can't fit in and be accepted. After all, I have new friends friends from out of town, don't I? They bring some much needed new ideas. As long as they aren't arrogant and look down on the locals, everything is cool. Some of the new people actually take greater pride in the area than the locals do. They see potential the locals don't.

I'm now sorta a half outsider myself. I moved 12 miles up the road to the next town about 26 years ago. To some of the people who's families have been here since colonial days, I'm a new comer.

-Sixbears

Outsider's view

I was listening to someone complain about all the people she has to manage. They keep secrets from her. They are very bad at explaining what their projects are all about. That makes the manager's job as a go between very difficult.

Maybe it's because I'm old and cynical, but that didn't surprise me at all. It wasn't about the manager. It's about the system. I pointed out to her that there were few visible and immediate rewards for sharing knowledge and some serious downsides.

If no one knows exactly what you are doing, no one can tell you it's being done wrong.

As I saw it, the problem wasn't with the people, but with the system. Unfortunately, it wasn't in the manager's ability to change the system. She was stuck trying to change the people.

Of course, this was an outsider's view. No doubt there are a million little reasons for things being the way they are.

Quite a few things in the world have the incentives in the wrong place. Business is all about making money. That's fine as far as it goes, but it doesn't go far enough. Imagine if it was about improving the quality of human life. What if there were incentives for making the world a more peaceful and fun place?

-Sixbears