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.
Situation #1:
Angie: I'm from the Boston Area.
Milly: Wonderful! Where in Boston?
Angie:
Methuen.
Milly: Hmmmm that's funny. I live in Boston and have never heard of any place in the city called Methuen.
Angie: Ughh, actually, it's in The Valley. And it's not Andover,
Boxford, or Windham.
Milly: Ew! Do you live in a slum? Are your kids potheads? Do you shop at
Marshall's? DO YOU SPEAK FLUENT ENGLISH?!
Angie: What?
Situation #2:
Ryan: Yo, yo, I rep The Valley.
Santos: Sweet man. What part?
Ryan: Amherst.
Santos: Shit man, you ain't ghetto! You probably live in a colonial mansion. Try living in
Nashua with a drug bust or gang fight outside your house every ten minutes.
Ryan: No way homie. Am-town has way more oxy and e than
Trashua, cause we have the bank to buy all our shit off you!
The Valley: the trashiest place in America's northeast.