Southampton
August 2018 — I grew up in Southampton New York, having been raised there I learned a lot, the work ethic is high for young kids, most of them want to get out of the town for good. the town has great historical meaning, lots of old buildings, and lots of farms. growing up we spent our summers at the ocean or the bay, walking around the village, or exploring abandoned buildings. in the summer, Theres lots of tourists. this has its pros and its cons, Southampton is known for its night life, also its beaches, and its beauty. sadly, some of these tourists take it for granted. we often find our beaches littered on. I love the town I grew up but sometimes I wish that it wasn’t as materialistic as it is.
Lindenhurst
August 2018 — I grew up in Lindenhurst during the 2010’s, and though I am not native to it, I do consider it my hometown. A relatively uneventful place on the South Shore of Long Island, the town had a few brushes with notoriety. For example, it once hosted a political rally for a certain presidential candidate and received moderate media coverage. And then there was the time half the town was swept under water by a particularly powerful hurricane – again only to get us moderate media coverage. Still, Lindy remains a fascinating little gem. Like many other Long Island towns, it has an adorable little main street with shops, boutiques, and restaurants. It also has a good handful of beautiful parks, some beach-y, some with playgrounds, and others with relaxing fountains. I have many fond memories of walking the main thoroughfare after school with my friends or biking to town hall and throwing French fries for the seagulls. It’s a relatively small town, with a few elementary schools but only one middle school and one high school. Thus it has a tight-knit feel without feeling too closed in. It’s not a bad place to “be from” – everyone knows someone from Lindenhurst. We are a little bit in the middle of nowhere (if you can call any parts of Long Island “the middle of nowhere”, far-east parts of the island excluded), with most of the major malls and entertainment located in other towns. So with one or two exceptions, it’s fairly quiet. Even in just a few years, Lindenhurst has changed. The shops in the main street are the most noticeable difference. The theater took the place of the hair supply store (or was it the discount clothing store?) The café is no longer there, and the music store is half it’s size. The old pharmacy is still vacant, as are half the stores on the block where the ice cream place used to be. I don’t even know what happened to the comic shop. But there are signs of success there too – a new burger place and a busy new wing place, for example. In many ways Lindenhurst is a lot like any other Long Island town, yet its quiet beauty is home to all of its residents.