I believe growing up in a small town is something best appreciated when one gets older, and presumably wiser.

	Dave Ecklund, Shelly Olson's second brother, lives in Minneapolis. He is a pediatric resident at three Twin Cities hospitals. Dave says he appreciates his small-town upbringing - now that he's an adult. (Photo courtesy of Dave Ecklund)

I grew up on a dairy farm outside Askov, Minn., and it was not an experience I valued at the time.

I had watched enough TV and read enough books to know that most kids didn't come home from school and shortly thereafter change into "barn clothes" to go do the daily chores. As far as I could tell, most kids went into a fit when they were asked to take out the garbage. While I was cleaning the barn and helping to milk the cows, I was pretty sure most kids were eating at McDonald's, playing games in an arcade, or watching the latest movie.

Askov didn't have a McDonald's. Or an arcade. Or a movie theater. In fact, 20 years later, the nearest place to Askov in which those are found is about 20 miles from where I grew up - in Hinckley (which had nothing of the sort when I was a kid but has boomed with the building of the casino). While the rest of the world seemed to be spending its free time having fun, I felt like I was missing out on all the action.

I didn't realize that those things I took to be everyday parts of normal life were actually the things that made living in a small town so special.

On weekends when chores were finished early, my family would play board games or cards. When I met somebody on the street in town, they knew my name and would ask how my parents were doing. When I read the Askov American (to which I still subscribe), I personally knew the school board members, editorialists, and high schoolers featured in the local news. At the annual Rutabaga Festival I would stand in line for one of the most popular fair foods, aebelskiver (a Danish ball-shaped "pancake").

Twenty years later, all of these things still happen. When I go home to visit, it's as if I'm seeing members of a very extended family. They don't all get along all of the time, and they may sometimes stick their noses where they don't belong. But they belong to a community in which they believe strongly, and for which they will continue to fight - just like any other family.

I live in Minneapolis now, and I miss that close sense of community. I may recognize my neighbors, but I know only a few of them by name. When people meet on the sidewalk, they often don't make eye contact. People prefer to keep silent rather than hold a conversation when standing in line at the grocery store. I lock my doors when I go to bed.

I enjoy the conveniences of living in the city, and as a future pediatrician I will continue to practice in a metropolitan area. But I already know that I prefer living and working in a more closely-knit neighborhood within the city, as opposed to being in a sprawling suburb. I keep looking for that feeling of true community that I once knew, so that one day I can yet again find a place that I call "home."