travel lightly and carry a big stick

A pie sized slice of Americana

A great man once said, “America is a large friendly dog in a very small room. Every time it wags its tail, it knocks over a chair”. Actually it was Arnold Joseph Toynbee and I’ve never heard of him. I’ve discovered a lot in the past few weeks and not just the joy of writing with a quotation dictionary to hand. When the Brits think of America in their ubiquitous patronizing but indulgent way they think they know everything. Just like a parent who thinks they know their child but as soon as they turn their back, the child goes off and invents the atom bomb. America can still surprise.

I’m not sure whether to start by smashing a few preconceptions or reinforcing a few, but in the spirit of making everyone back home more comfortable I’ll start with what we ‘know’. Who needs a pick up truck with a bonnet that comes up to the same height as your shoulder? Apparently, a surprising number of folks (people). This has been a point of some self righteous indignation on my part since my arrival but I have now discovered the cause is not careless wastefulness on the part on the locals but a money saving scheme. Sounds strange? Let me explain.

In an alleged effort to boost the construction industry, the US government has introduced tax breaks on vehicles over 3 tons in weight – the effect being the US car companies hugely increasing the number of 3 ton cars produced at rock bottom prices. In effect it acts as a tax break on US produced cars as no foreign manufacturer can produce gun-less tanks and pay the import costs. Once the tax benefit comes into play, the same price buys you a nice sensible car or a monster truck. As someone who orders steak over salmon on the basis of price to weight ratio I understand the rational choice on offer. Very clever. This is why even here in Eau Claire, a modest town half the size of Portsmouth, can still support a huge Hummer dealership.

America isn’t just New York and Los Angeles, there’s a huge space in between that most people only take the trouble to fly over, and that is know as ‘the mid west’. By mid west we don’t mean its halfway between the modern world and a saloon bar shootout but more like the people from here aren’t from either coast and don’t want to be lumped together with the Texans. It is in this large middle area that I have found my home away from home. Liz’s parents have welcomed us with open arms and we’ve been enjoying some wholesome Wisconsin hospitality and the chance to explore the real America.
Wisco, as it is known to the natives, like so many US states, has a nickname – The Cheese state. Not too terrifying or inspiring you might think but certainly a step up the ladder from The Mosquito State of New Jersey, or the delightfully descriptive Tar and Turpentine State of North Carolina. Supporters of the local football team, the Green Bay Packers don huge foam cheese wedge hats on match day, striking fear into the opposition, perhaps one to suggest to the Pompey fan club.

The state has a huge amount of woodland and lakes which I’ve been exploring on foot, bike and kayak. Due to its massive and apparently out of control, deer population everyone who calls himself a man hunts. Walking into a sports store the other day, I was slightly taken aback by finding that it was in fact an armory. Rifles, pistols the length of my fore arm, cross bows and long bows stretched as far as I could see (due to the high shelves admittedly). I felt for a second like Neo ‘I need guns, lots of guns’, but no need to escape the matrix here, so I left them put. I did toy with the idea of getting a rather nice faux leaf pile body suit though. This time of year, you should wear orange in the woods to prevent anyone from mistaking you for a dear that talks and walks on its hind legs and duly shooting you.

Last month we took a trip up to the U.P. which is upper peninsular Michigan. It’s pretty remote and fairly well preserved in its natural state. The folks here are known as yupers – no relation to the much hated 80’s bourgeoisie social sect – this is a harsh land, but a beautiful one, lying on the shores of Lake Superior. Pity I accidentally deleted all my photos. We went to an area known for ship wrecks and went diving on three of them – my first wreck dives.

On the cultural side of things I’ve been to a performance by second city – a Chicago based improvisation comedy group and a performance of Broadway classic songs, of which I knew none – surprise, surprise, I’ve been laboring for years under the delusion that South Pacific was a place. Breaking away from the genteel we sampled the delights of the local Oktoberfest celebrations and a country music bar – where I left the crowd in stunned silenced with my partner swinging, doe-si-doeing, willow stripping (that’s a dance people!) antics. Actually we didn’t win the ‘slow dance’ prize on offer, because at the end, the incompetent judge said he couldn’t decide who should win and said the first person to get on stage and give him a ‘hell yeah’ would take the prize. I got to stage first but was frozen by the thought ‘what the hell is a ‘hell yeah’’ some kind of strange hand slapping ritual? No, just shouting ‘hell yeah’ as loud as possible and it seems I was too late.

Who ever said the US doesn’t have history!?! Well pretty much that’s true, but they’ve got something better; pretend history and it’s far more fun. We spent a day at the Renaissance festival, a big fair that runs for two months of the year just outside of Minneapolis. Everyone gets to dress up in costume, put on ridiculous British accents and basically live just like they did, way back when….. Eating turkey legs, onion rings, buying souvenirs, the usual. Actually the costume and jousting were a little more medieval than renaissance but now I’ve learnt that to get the most out of life you sometimes have to let these ‘details’ pass. They have a lot of stages putting on entertainment throughout the day, one of the most popular ones being, ‘vilification tennis’. Two teams insult each other across a net and a judge awards points for the vilest insult (your mother was a hamster and your father smelt of elderberries, that kind of thing). I don’t remember that from history class but some humor is timeless.

Last but not least, the hugest celebration of the year here is coming up next week. No, not Thanksgiving but Halloween. They love it. I’ve seen houses decked out with lights and statues for the last two weeks in preparation. The pumpkin carving parties started at the start of the month, ‘won’t they rot?’ I said. Not to worry was the reply, this way you get to carve twice as many. Perhaps not surprising from the people that gave us global warming (sorry Liz, admittedly below the belt). We’ve been working on costumes this week, something I mention in order to prove I am spending my time productively, and expect to be indistinguishable from Beatlejuice this time next week. So that’s all for now, perhaps now I’ll try to write less and more frequently, I guess we’ll see…..

PS yes yes, before I get comments about incorrect spelling its the heretical version of word I'm using.

posted by justplainnigel @ 9:48 PM