I live in the suburbs and really love it. My neighborhood is quiet and easy to walk around without much road noise. There’s a small park within our neighborhood that children play in and people take their dogs.
I have a front yard and back yard that’s mostly grass, but we do plant flowers and plants when the weathers nice. It gives me an excuse to be outside during the summer. And yeah, I do grow vegetables and garden in the backyard as do many others. The fenced in backyard makes it easy to have a pet with room to run.
Despite my neighborhood being quiet it’s adjacent to a commercial area, so I can walk within 10 minutes to a grocery store (a Walmart to be fair) and if I’d like, I can hop on public transit that has a bus stop right there. There’s restaurants, fast food, groceries and other small businesses like dry cleaners, hair stylists, banks, and gyms. All easily within 10 minutes of walking. The local public transit can get you to major shopping centers and downtown areas in a reasonable amount of time.
I mostly drive and what I love the most is that I can drive to heavily populated areas with activity within 5-10 minutes but my neighborhood itself is this quiet sleepy little suburb where kids play in cul-de-sacs without worrying about traffic and I know many of my neighbors by name.
I definitely get how suburbs can look bad, but it doesn’t mean they have to be.