The East Coast, and certainly Boston, has a provincial quality to it that makes it harder to bust out and move up. Try to be too different and they'll pull you down.
Indifference is harder to fight than hostility, and there is nothing that kills an agitation like having everybody admit that it is fundamentally right.
The truth sets you free. It's a very liberating thing, when you say this is who I am warts and all and then you can just get on with life. It's amazing.