North Dakota, Land of Misperception
August 10, 2007
Filed in: North Dakota
So, North Dakotans! Are you weary of people referring to Mt. Rushmore as being in your state, when it fact it’s not?
Weary of people who say, “Well, what about the Badlands,” clearly meaning Badlands National Park, which also is in South Dakota?
(There are badlands in North Dakota, they’re...
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Landscapes So, So Familiar
August 05, 2007
Filed in: The Home Front
Just back from finally seeing Edward Hopper at the MFA. Stunning, brilliant, color-soaked, flat. I love Hopper. My mom loves Hopper. She has two Hopper prints hanging in her otherwise un-art-heavy house, including the one (as she reminded us at lunch after the exhibit) she cut out of a magazine...
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How It Will All End
July 30, 2007
Filed in: Alaska, Hawaii, Kansas, North Dakota
So here’s the plan: Kansas. Alaska. Hawaii. The extreme ends and the smack middle of these our United States.
(Somewhere a little northwest of Lebanon, KS is the geographic center of the lower 48 states. The geographic center of all 50 United States is outside of Castle Rock, SD but I’ve...
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How It All Began
July 23, 2007
Filed in: Alaska, Hawaii, Kansas, North Dakota
Close to six years ago, C’s second-grade teacher--a bit of a free spirit (some used the phrase “utter chaos” to describe her classroom, but C and I both loved her creativity)--sent him home with an assignment. Find out something unique about a family member and write about it.
Since he’d...
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Apologies All Round
July 18, 2007
Filed in: The Home Front
You’re going about your business, trying to stay out ahead of things. You’re making sure the bills don’t get swept into the recycling bin, making sure the kids have a vegetable at lunch, making sure you stay away from that one co-worker in the coffee room.
You try to hug your spouse once a day,...