The Valley

To those of us from New England, "The Valley" most often refers to the Merrimack Valley, a bi-state area along the Merrimack River. Most of the Valley is suburban. The largest cities are Haverhill, MA, Lawrence, MA, Lowell, MA, Nashua, NH, Manchester, NH, and Concord, NH. All of these cities are former mill towns powered by the river. If you live in the Merrimack Valley region, chances are you tell everyone you're from the "Boston Area", have a Boston accent, and cheer for all the Boston sports teams, even though Boston is an hour away. About half the people in your high school graduating class went to drug rehab before the age of 18. Unless your zip code is 01810, 05501, 01899, 01921, 01985, 01886, 03110, 03031, 03049, or 03087, you are working class/poor. Chances are, if you are from the working-class areas you pretend to be rich, while if you are from the rich areas you pretend to be "ghetto". Ethnic pride is high in The Valley. You will see more Irish, Italian, Canadian, Lebanese, Cambodian, Brazilian, Puerto Rican, and Dominican flags than American ones, though almost every other street is named for a KIA war soldier. All in all, The Valley is a place of contradictions, not to mention a shitty place to live and an even shittier place to say you're from.