To be worried about village life already?

[AdoptedBumpkin]

Hi all. This is my first post, so be gentle.

We moved as a family from Greater London to a medium sized village in a national park a few weeks ago. While I enjoy some aspects of rural life, I am beginning to worry about some of the villagers. They seem to gossip a lot about each other and it seems probable that that they must gossip about us, if only because not much else is going on.

Yesterday I was walking through the village with my daughter and passed a local old-ish couple. I heard the lady say something about 'the gilet' and I was wearing my purple North face gilet. It may have been positive and/or throwaway, but it spooked me that something so mundane would be commented on. I am used to a life where you really have to try hard to stand out.

@OctoberLovers

You can look at it two ways - in villages people do tend to gossip and be into each other's business but there's a sense of community that you don't often get when your anonymous in a big town or city. I grew up in a village and have known many of the residents my whole life. Is it always a good thing? No not when you're having issues or drama in your life and everyone wants dibs on it. But on the other hand I would never be short of help and support in an emergency.

Plus we have a great local!

I moved to a village of 340 people, spread over 3 miles in 186 properties. Gradually we have been invaded by townies, taking us to a population of 540 and it is like Clapham Junction with so many people about. They drive like they are still in the big city and try and change the village into what they had previously where they came from. My original town had 500,000 and because of my job, sometimes I lived in a caravan in the middle of a field with only cows for neighbours and they generously left me presents every day. I then moved to the isolated out parts of a small village and bought a small cottage which looked like a garden shed and brought up my children. My kids have been to school in Gretna Green, Northampton and Suffolk and they all have different accents. I've been called the 'nutter' in the field, the gardener (I was cutting my own grass) and the employed dogsbody. As the children got older WE moved to a bigger house 4 miles away in the next village which is listed in the Domesday Book so it has a long history. We have had actors, actresses, a weatherman from tv and a Blue Peter presenter move here at various times. You must learn to love the solitude, 24 miles to a supermarket, 10 miles to a cinema with 100 seats, schools 5 and 15 miles away and 1 bus service a month with only two locations served which is decided by the passengers each time. You can get off part way and catch a big bus which visits which picks up at nearly every place you have never heard of but doesn't return until the next morning. So a journey to a village 10 miles away takes 4-=5 hours to get there, an overnight stay and the same to get back. I absolutely love it and remember children's friends always seem to live about 10 miles away so two cars are essential. I have deer in the garden, pheasants, owls, 20 types of birds, a family of rats down the bottom of the field, two foxes and even a full grown pig one day wandering through the grass. A neighbour opened the front door one day to be confronted by a full-sized reindeer with massive antlers. They were nearly within kissing distance so I've been told and once both brains engaged the friend screamed, the deer walked across the front garden and casually jumped the 5 ft fence. After a while, everyone will know your inside leg measurement, the names of all your holiday destinations and even what you'll have for breakfast next week. I would never go back.

@AdoptedBumpkin

I give you 3 years tops.

I live in in the village I grew up in. I moved to the city (very small city) and lived there for 10 years. Then back to the village. I liked living in both. City when I was young and child free, good for nights out, house parties ect. Back to the village as a parent. So much better for children. Yes everyone knows everyone but in our village if I need a favour I could ask 10 people easily and they'd all say yes! I also take my daughter to the same primary school I went to, as do some of my classmates grown up and back in the village also. Also I imagine when she's a teenager if she gets up to anything she shouldn't someone will see and let me know! Also made friends with another single mum who moved here from Lithuania a few years before I moved back. Her and her child are 'different' in many ways but definitely been 'accepted' as part of the village

I grew up in one tiny village, lived briefly in a largish city then a medium sized town and have ended up back in a different tiny village.

Ime the people that don't last long are the ones that move in with a very strong preconceived idea that either a) it's going to be super gossipy and exclusionary or b) it's going to be idyllic and perfect 100% of the time.

If you immediately assume you're an outsider and everyone is talking about you it becomes a self fulfilling prophecy.

I’m afraid this would make me want to run a very long way in the direction of the nearest city. Even the positive descriptions sound like way too much hard work.

Had to Google North Face Gilet.

Too much effort living in a village. If your face doesn’t fit it doesn’t matter what you do. Life is too short to worry about impressing others just to fit in.

I too live in a very rural village, it is gossip central, I don't get involved and just wave and smile.

I grew up in a village in the Cotswolds. Everyone knew each other and their business. It's just how it was. It's like having a massive extended family - you can't escape! I live 200+ miles away now in a city (and love it, would never go back) but my parents and many childhood friends are still there. Sometimes I hear gossip or news from my friends about village life before my parents do and they are always amazed at how I knew before them.
I think if you are an 'outsider' then you will be ingratiated into the fold if you go to the local pub (probably the best thing you can do), get involved in a local sports club (football or cricket club and volunteer to help out) and speak to as many people as you can. Villagers will be very accepting of most people if they also make an effort to join in community life.

Village dweller too...

So get in there, go to the pub... don't like pubs, tough, you do now, GO TO THE PUB.

THIS

... but don't win the pub quiz. Yet.

"Look Agnes...how bizarre, a coat with no arms"

I too lived in a National Park for several years after moving out of the London area, sadly the beauty of the area and our lovely house was not enough to keep us there as the locals were extremely small minded snobs, gossipy, cliquey and generally very unwelcoming to 'outsiders', we were even verbally abused and bullied by some neighbours to the point I was suffering severe anxiety and PTSD. Would never move back to there or anywhere similar. Thankfully a job relocation forced us to leave the area.

You've just reminded me that my DH and I once lived for 6 months in a small hamlet in the north York moors NP. On the day we moved in our neighbour came round to introduce herself and informed us that everyone else in the hamlet participated in a village lottery. £50 a month!! We politely declined and were subsequently ignored or greeted with frosty responses for the rest of the time we were there.

Sorry to hear that @Schwibble.

Currently on a weekend break from London to a lovely cottage in the Peak District. Spending a lot of time dreaming of moving somewhere idyllic like this. But this thread and another one about rural living versus city dwelling as made me reconsider. I am probably better where I am. I hate people knowing my business. And the reliance on a car.

In London, you dont even know your neighbours (Normal way of life)

I wouldn't say that's 'normal.'

OP give it time,they were probably just saying what a pp said about your gilet.

@MrsPelligrinoPetrichor

That's very normal for London

@Ellapaella That's awful!

We were 'the new people' in our village for years and years. Takes a long time to be accepted but a recent influx of new new people has relegates us to villagers. I'd say always be polite, always contribute to the latest fundraising initiative/attend the village Christmas fair etc and you can't go wrong.

That's very normal for London

Not my experience of 25 years living there (not in one place) or any of my friends.

My family moved to a village when I was 8. I still live here now (46) and I’m still told that I won’t be a local until “I ‘ave someone in the churchyard”!! This is meant in terms of someone from my family being buried there not shagging someone up against a gravestone!

This is precisely why I moved out of the claustrophobic village I grew up in and moved to a city! ... I like going to the country / villages on holiday but after about 4 days it does my head in ...

Sorry OP - hope you settle and can tolerate the stuff I found too much - i.e. everyone knowing everything about everyone else (or if they didn't just making it up so it became received wisdom) and so little going on that every little thing takes on a huge significance.

Also wondering if you are just going through the normal 'reality check' of realising it isn't quite the idyllic paradise you dreamed it would be ...