I think it's more related to the language importance than it's size. We have continental countries (Russia, Brazil, etc) that you can also drive for a week without leaving and learning English is important there.

If the world had chosen another language for communication probably US citizens would need to learn another language still.

A low enough priority that the further I get in my efforts, the more it sinks in with me that I'm mostly wasting my time. It's a hobby more than a skill.

My attempts to learn my family's native language have hit a roadblock: now that I have a handle on the grammar, there is no one for me to speak to. It's frankly pretty upsetting and I'm very discouraged about it.

You're required to know at least a workable amount of English in order to live and work here, so no matter where they were born, there is absolutely no one in what feels like this entire NW hemisphere that I do not already share a language with. And only one time have I ever known before they said. All other times, they've just happened to mention they're from there after I say something about learning it.

Most immigrants I've met are perfectly incognito, and they speak more than well enough for us to understand each other casually. The point of language is to communicate. Goal achieved.

Trying to find a language partner in this situation is proving not only impossible, it's nigh-pointless to even do unless you're bored. It's the same online — nearly everyone already shares a language with me, you'd never guess most of the time, and even country-specific subs sometimes post things in english.

There's literally no one for me to practice on and zero need to practice unless I feel like going halfway around the globe pretty often in order to make the effort worthwhile. At which point they will still speak to me in english unless I'm lost in the super rural areas, and I will simply cry.

I've come to accept that going overseas even once in my life is never going to happen. Europeans seem to vastly overestimate Americans ability to afford to do that. Even if we could, we still have an entire hemisphere to get through first. Which costs significantly less, is almost just as fun, and doesn't take multiple years of work for a skill you'll only ever use once.

Tabarnac.

Also when you genocided the indigenous people so hard you never needed to adopt any loan words from the native language.