If I'm tired of all the crowds and congestion in the Philadelphia area, where is a nearby rural area I can escape to?

The rest of the state can be pretty rural around Bird in Hand etc

Chadds Ford ...........

Try Skippack, Cedars or Collegeville.

i used to live in upstate ny, you might like that area

This is a quote from a Poirot novel by Agatha Christie.

“I thought I could escape the wickedness of the city by moving to the country. The fields that are green, the singing of the birds. The faces that are smiling and friendly. Huh! The fields that are green are the secret burial places of the victims of murders most hideous. The birds sing only briefly before some idiot shoots them. And the faces all smiling and friendly...what do they conceal?”

Move to a smaller neighborhood.