I grew up in Eastern Massachusetts in the small town of Foxborough. Before coming to school, I never really thought about how life in the western part of the state may have differed from that of the East. Well, let me tell you, by moving just across the state I received a little bit of a culture shock. It wasn’t until visiting the hometown of one of my suitemates here at school that I realized just how different life in Western Massachusetts really is.

Back home, I was surrounded by cul-de-sacs and cookie-cutter neighborhoods that enveloped cookie-cutter houses. If you had more than an acre of land, your yard was one of the biggest and you automatically became the one to host the playdates. So, when my suite mate, Lexi, told me that she lived on a fifty-two-acre farm I simply could not believe it. The stranger thing is that her family owning that amount of land isn’t even unique because, in Western Mass, it’s quite a common occurrence.

Naturally, I wanted to explore all that those fifty-two acres had to offer. The four of us hopped on some four-wheelers and we were off, racing around open fields and taking in the scenery. It was then that I realized I certainly wasn’t in Foxborough anymore.

I mastered the four-wheeler in no time at all. Before I knew it, I was sitting in the seat of what was perhaps the largest tractor I’ve ever seen. Despite having Lexi to my right talking me through the process, I could not have been more scared. I was convinced I would run into the barn or even the horses. Little did I know, it really was just like driving a car and I had nothing to fear at all. In the end, I am still struggling to grasp the concept that something so foreign to me can be so familiar to someone that grew up in the same state as me. 

Like I said, going to school in the western part of Massachusetts has given me so many new opportunities that were never feasible back home. However, I still am taken aback by the endless fields and the abundance of farmland. In my eighteen years, I could never have told you that there were different types of cows and I honestly never would have been able to tell the difference between healthy and burnt corn. Don’t get me wrong, I’m definitely not a professional by any means. But, after my trip to Hadley with my friends, I just might be able to teach you how to drive a tractor.