What do you miss about the town/city/country you grew up in ?

I left my birthplace at age 2. I continued to visit family there and always thought of it as home. During many unhappy years in Wales my longing to return became overwhelming.
At last I came back and will stay here forever, loving my little town and never wanting to leave.

My home city has seen better days like many others I suppose. I have lived away from there for 62 years. Love going back there on family history visits. So many roads not far from the centre of town and still intact had the businesses or homes of my ancestors. So much to see, churchyards to visit. What I really miss is the opportunity to volunteer at the family history library and similar opportunities. I would love that.

I grew up in Lichfield and loved it. We were able to roam freely and safely everywhere and could walk to the shops, the park, roam through the fields and walk to school in a group from being very young. We had a lovely group of friends who cared for each other.
I still like it when I return (infrequently) now, but it is much more developed now, housing estates everywhere and more like Birmingham overspill. But I still like the tow centre and the history.

I still live in the area where I grew up but most of the architecture has been destroyed and replaced with glass and metal boxes.
We no longer have proper shops, not one department store or M&S, the hight street is dominated by coffee shops and fast food outlets.

I grew up in the middle of Chelsea. No definitely not rich. Very working class. There were estates owned by Trusts bought to house working class people. In those days the land in Chelsea was cheap .Now a housing association has taken over and there was a struggle to maintain the tenancies at affordable rents. Some are now fully renovated and ready for the,wealthy to live in. Loved Chelsea, next to us was St. Luke’s, the Parish Church,where Charles Dickens was married (and so were we). Kings Road was where you could see famous faces,strange outfits and often bare feet, not because shoes couldn’t be afforded. Chelsea Art School provided plenty of artists who dressed whichever way they chose. Then there were the South Kensington museums. The Victorian and Albert and the Natural History were my favourites. Used to visit frequently armed with a sketch book and pencils to draw the wonderful dresses in glass cases or a huge bear. Then the science museum was interesting and we always enjoyed the door that opened as you approached. A number 11 bus could take us to the art galleries and we could feed the pigeons or look at Van Gogh’s sunflowers. All free entry. Then there were all the parks Battersea, Kensington, Hyde Park. All within walking distance. When I was at school there was still a work house.My brother had a friend who invited him to tea there and described it. I also had friends there. We were a mixed bunch as children of antique dealers, journalists, policemen, all at school together. Going shopping you could be standing next to Dinah Dorrs Clair Bloom etc etc. There was always something to do. You could walk into St Paul’s or Westminster Abbey etc etc no payment was needed although there were donations. The Royal family were out and about in Victoria when I was at my secondary school. As we went swimming one day the teacher said “look girls, Prince Charles”. There he was sitting on his nanny’s lap in the front next the chauffeur.The car stopped and we crossed over in front of it all of us waving to Prince Charles while he waved back. Loved living in Chelsea.



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I lived on the Isle of Skye for 7 years and had I been married to my present husband would still be there. Sadly though when I've returned everything has changed. The bridge has made the main road running through the island to the north into a juggernaut highway. The feeling of isolation, which I enjoyed, has gone completely for me although some visitors still love the island as they have never known anything else. Nothing stays the same but I suppose that's progress for you.

I certainly don’t miss the ‘dark, Satanic mills’ which employed members of my grandparents’ generation! However, there was a greater sense of community in the 50s/60s/70s. The irony of it is that architects seem to think we want to be reminded of said mills, by designing modern apartments in the same style and preserving the mill chimneys! We can see one from our house…

I grew up in Bristol and Bournemouth. I miss all the shops in Bristol and the 2 for 1 pub meals, bargain shops where things were cheap and my remaining family that live on the outskirts of Bristol. Fond memories of Bournemouth with my mum on the back of her bike off for picnics after school most days. Plus the community there seemed much friendlier. Had 2 very good years there when I was 6.

I miss having a dog. My 8 year old brother got me one the day I was born. He decided to call her Bronco.

Oh there’s some wonderful posts and memories here, I love reading them. Most areas ,including where we live, don’t seem to improve much with time because they keep shoving up more and more houses with less and less green space in between. They don’t seem to have a lot of aesthetic sense these days.

I was born in Southport. Apparently I left at 9 months old so no memories. Then lived in Cheshire, Lincolnshire, Derbyshire. Settled in Leigh on sea in Essex for a while then back to Staffordshire and Warwickshire before moving to Trinidad at the age of 11. At 12, back to Staffordshire, before going to Kuwait. My son finds all this hard to understand but my biological father was a naval engineer and so was my stepfather. My journey didn’t stop there. We returned from Kuwait by car in the sixties and I am writing a book about it. My education was interrupted obviously but, how can I put this? I passed entrance exams for further education and only wanted to go to medical college. My teachers always told my parents that I was so ahead of their students who never left home. Not sure why but my parents just wanted me to be normal and get married and have a baby. Oh well.

I miss the Brummie humour.

Mile End!

Silverbrooks

I was born in London and now live only 40 miles away. I worked there for 50 years. Now retired I can still be back there in under 30 minutes by train and go as often as I can.

I ascribe to the saying: When a (wo)man is tired of London, (s)he is tired of life.

I hope I will never tire of everything London has to offer in terms of history and culture. Just to walk along its streets always gives me a thrill.

Were I to quit suburbia, I would seriously consider buying a small apartment in London so I could fall out of bed and have all that culture on my doorstep.

Ever since I was 20 I’ve fancied living in an apartment in the Barbican. It’s a Marmite thing but I like the Brutalist architecture.

Ah Silverbrooks - you said it for me. I don’t live quite so close but DD1 lives in Mike End so I get to visit often.

I still live in the same village.
I can see the house where I was born and grew up in when I look out of one of my back bedroom windows.

Yes definitely more attached to our married home town than my childhood home town.

I was born in London and lived there for first 30 years of my life. When we first moved I missed the huge library near my home and the museums. I visited family members often for many years. I watched it it all change as major developments changed the look of everything traffic got horrendous. I hate it now and find it extremely stressful. I love living in the countryside fields and trees and fresh air.

4allweknow

I miss absolutely nothing. I miss more from some of the various places I lived in in the first 35 years of marriage.

Same here.

I missed the last city from the country I moved to. Middle size city, very safe, very green, churches everywhere, buses everywhere, parks, museums, eateries, all kinds of night and day-life venues, with the feel of a country town

I don't.
Years ago I was passing childhood town so made a small detour to old haunts. The rural backwater house I grew up in (Grandparents council house) which was just down the road from greatgranddparents farm; and a short walk to the graveyard where my grandmother and greatgrandmother were buried. The sleepy back of beyond, on the banks of a river where as a child I taught myself to swim. (alone, in 20 ft of water; it worked)

Bloody hell. GParents very plain council house now gentrified The cast iron water pump I had to fill buckets from (NO indoor plumbing) was now a fancy garden feature. GGP's farm similarly unrecognisable and renamed "Badgers Crossing". Up on the river bank, now fenced off, discovered the hard way it's an electric fence. My grand father walked 4 miles to work along that unfenced bank for 40 years. Set off for churchyard. Great Granny stone tomb still there. Grave of Granny (died 1956) now occupied by a total stranger ( and their headstone).

WTF? My long-dead mothers best friend at school lived next to grave yard so I knocked on the door and caught up with the gossip.
Yes, the graveyard is now so full they are re-using old plots Human bones and one time a skull, have sometimes been tossed over fence into their garden. Complaints about sloppy gravedigger excused as "work of foxes".

The fencing off of the river (by the millionaire owners of Badger Crossing) was under dispute.

Mother's friend asked why we had never put a headstone marking Granny's grave so I had to tell her. Grandad, very tight and a dramatic drunk, declared he would never visit her holy grave because the grief would kill him. He gave my mother £600 in cash to commission the very best headstone. ( a crazy fortune at that time) Meanwhile, my aunt (his daughter) was in dire straits. Her siblings decided to do what Granny would have done. They defied Grandfather, hoping he'd never find out, and gave the gravestone money to Granny's desperate daughter. No headstone. No wonder granny got dug up.

I haven't been back again.

I miss the friendliness and knowing most of the people who lived on the avenue, however I would not change to where I live now as we are about five minutes near the harbour, the mountains, the countryside.

I forgot to say my hometown was in Surrey, now I'm just into Sussex.

We moved 3 times in my childhood within the town and its environs. I think I romantasised our first house, I don't know why it didn't have any central heating. I was there till about aged 9. I just remember its very long garden and at the bottom beyond the fence was a stream that fed into a lovely duck pond, beyond that a cricket green and a pub called The Cricketers what else. I had a friend whose parents owned that pub and her mum would often give us a bag of crisps and an Orangina when we were in their garden, which was a massive treat back then. I met another friend when I was aged 4 or 5 her garden juxtaposed with ours she actually lived in a road around the corner but our gardens kind of converged at a point. Staring under the fence we locked eyes and there was born a friendship, her and her sister had a wonderful collection of Sindy/Barbie Dolls and a swing in their garden, could it get any better. Needless to say I was at hers when ever I was invited. Plus they'd lived in India for a couple of years so their bedroom was like a treasure trove of amazing things. I also had another very close friend nearby who had an Old English Sheepdog who I adored. So my memories of my first house were made up of such experiences. My town is just over 20 miles away from where I live now, I don't miss it I'd rather live where I am. One of my old school friends lives there still, she came back to it after living firstly in the US and then Australia, she thinks it's the centre of the universe, she is however deluded.

300 miles away from my home town and haven't lived there 25 years.
Still have family there and miss them but sadly the town / area is not as it was .
( As are most other places )

Moonwatcher1904, having grown up there I miss being able to walk to the sea and along the prom.

Where I live now the sea is a bit too far to walk and there's no way to do it without walking on roads without pavements (lethal). If I drove to the sea it'd only take 10 minutes but everywhere charges for parking now. It wasn't like that when I moved here, it was free in winter and before 7am and after 6pm in summer. If I just popped for 20 mins of sea air a day the costs mounts and I'm not ashamed to say I have to be more careful with my pension than that.

Another thing I miss is the trams and the ability to get a taxi at short notice.

(I know some would say it is cheaper than buying a coffee but I never buy one or eat out so I can't switch the budget to favour the sea).