It was on my second or third date with my future husband that he told me the same old, classic phrase: “I can’t wait to leave Utah.”
Then he told me why Provo and Utah weren’t for him, how glad he was not to have grown up in Utah and never want to raise a family here. He had come to BYU about two weeks earlier.
I’m from Provo. I attended elementary, middle and high school here and am now attending BYU. Everything he said to me has probably been said to me hundreds of times. It hurts every time because I really loved living here.
Hope people will understand. Your Utah experience is what you choose. You will never experience anything like it.
Utah is an imperfect place where imperfect people live. I promise I am fully aware of its shortcomings. However, I believe that it is up to each of us individually whether we make the best of it.
Everyone has the right to their opinion and their own experiences. Attending BYU throughout my undergraduate education has given me the opportunity to speak to people who have come to Provo from all over the United States and around the world. It seems that the same reasons people move to or visit Utah are the same reasons Utah-born residents stay nearby.
According to the World Population Review, Utah currently has a growth rate of 1.64%, which ranks fourth in the country. People’s reasons for coming to Utah from other states vary; the main reasons are limited to family and educational opportunities, religious affiliation, and Utah’s beautiful natural scene.
The University of Utah’s Kem C. Gardiner Policy Institute released a report this year showing that Utah is receiving large numbers of immigrants. “Immigrants make up 4% of Utah’s population, or 133,000 people, and 25,000 of those immigrants have come from abroad,” the report said.
I believe that Utah’s family and educational opportunities are major draws. The various beautiful outdoor attractions in Utah are truly breathtaking. These positive aspects make me wonder what a state needs to have so that people stop complaining about it.
If you were born in Utah, what reasons are you still here? I encourage you to reflect on what you have here and what you have contributed in a unique way to your home state. Perhaps you live in Utah and you sure will leave as soon as possible.
A Utah-born friend of mine said, “I wonder how people would feel if people said some of the things they say about Utah, about their home states.”
Whether you’d rather live elsewhere or not, Utah played a role in who you are.
If you weren’t originally from Utah, you came here for a reason: to take advantage of its advantages. Perhaps you came here to take advantage of the low cost of education offered by highly qualified universities in Utah. Perhaps some have come to find a spouse who shares the same beliefs. Perhaps you came for Utah’s beautiful mountains, which are great for skiing and snowboarding.
Whether you stay in Utah for a year or 20 or not, you’re here because you found something in Utah that you couldn’t find anywhere else.
About a week or two after that previous conversation with my future husband, he traveled back to Seattle to see his family. After he returned to Provo, he told me that he had imagined I was with him in Washington and that he had thought of taking me to all the landmarks in his life.
“I thought about if you’d come to my house, where I went to high school and where I was sculpted, and I told myself the same thing that I told you about Provo. If you did that when I had never lived there, I would be so hurt, ”he said. I am very happy to say that Utah has really grown on him.
In conclusion, I hope people feel like Utah is a place they can happily call home – whether it’s just for a college semester, a few years to build a career and a family, or a lifetime. I want Utah residents, natives and transients, to be able to give something of themselves to the state that has a lot to offer.
In the end you are here. Enjoy it.
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