Michigana

[nuncstans]

I'm tired of the lie that Midwesterners are straight-taahkin', haanest-dealin', friendly blond goyim. Midwesterners are mean!

anarqueso got me thinking about this with her post about community. Readers, I am rarely depressed. I mean, I get "depressed", like when it's gray outside and I'm bored and broke, and I have a hunger headache and I see a poster for

Comments

[hunterxtc]

The Midwest doesn't really embrace people that are different... the theory of different being that if you have lived on the east or west coast, and you come to the wonderful Midwest, you must (a) be a spy for some government kabal or (b) you are a terrorist.

I will admit, I like Ohio on the whole- the people are generally much friendlier than anyone I met in Boston or New York City, and they are more willing to help you if you are down and out. Although I'm sure you will be able to adapt to the harsh reality that is "the Midwest", a lot of people will come here from the coasts and of course find fault with it, and they of course are going to be looked at with "the evil eye of the Midwest."

But then again, I probably got the same thing when I lived on the east coast.

[nuncstans]

The thing is, I hate it when people living in metropolitan areas look down on the periphery. I try not to make assumptions about people I don't know (but not-making-assumptions itself might be a metropolitan trait, because you know first-hand, from daily contact with a wide range of people, that you can't tell crazy by the accent or the suit it's wearing

[hunterxtc]

I asked my students a question the first day (did they want to read this thing in class, or at home) and nobody answered. I asked again. Silence. I said ok, raise your hand if you want to read this here. Everybody looked around, nobody raised their hand.

Could it just be because the students are lazy asses who didn't read the assignment, and they were just being honest? I had this same experience in my east coast schooling... but then again, most people at BU had been out partying the night before, so they perhaps had a legit reason not to answer. But there is always one know it all in class who wants to show off- I'm surprised your class didn't have one!

[nuncstans]

It was the first day!

[smallstages]

What you say here really resonates with me -- this bit about hating it when people living in metropolitan areas (or, even, just on the West Coast in general) look down on the periphery (or the whole rest of the country except for the East Coast). I applied to several Midwest schools for just this reason -- I was feeling a bit like I was living in a bubble and was losing sight of what the rest of the "American experience" is, even though I grew up in Louisiana and Texas. Fifteen years on the West Coast had made me feel like nothing existed beyond the West Coast, you know? I know what it's like to be queer in liberal West Coast communities. What's it like to be queer in Bloomington. But now I have these creeping doubts. I don't need to be a queer hero!

Trying to Love the Midwest

[nuncstans]

I just want to add that I lived in Ohio for several years, and overall I had a great time. Things were a little weird, such as when I couldn't open a bank account, but to equalize that I opened a bank account here with no problem at all.

Re: Trying to Love the Midwest

[hunterxtc]

I just read your bank story to Tammy, who of course is Miss Midwestern banking personified (except that she doesn't have the bangs and the moles) and she was wondering (a) what backwoods town this bank was in and (b) why the hell you didn't walk out of there (I told her it was the only bank in town, which must make it an even more scary time)...

I just made a post on "The Midwest" and I will admit, I will never ever live in "The South" because I know that I would have experiences on an everyday basis that you had in the bank. And with Tammy as my significant other??! Yikes!

I know there are a lot of times that living here in North Caucasian that I am seen as "the exotic one", and I guess I'm OK with that... as long as they aren't burning crosses on my lawn!

Re: Trying to Love the Midwest

[ms_priestypants]

oh! I feel the need to stick up for at least my little corner of the South (Atlanta)- though there is racism there of course, I felt more comfortable going out with my African American boyfriend there, where people might talk in the kitchen but smiled to our faces, than in my neighborhood in New York, where I have lived for the past year and a half, where we got outright stared at walking down the street. It might just be the comfort of one bad system displaced when encountering another, different bad system, I guess.

Re: Trying to Love the Midwest

[hunterxtc]

Well, I think the black white thing is always going to be a part of our culture, and the ability to out and out stare without repurcussions is a fact of life. Tammy and I have had the classic Jungle Fever episode in a restaurant where a black waitress was refusing to serve us (this was in Pittsburgh) but on the whole it isn't very blatant around here. One funny thing is that at Bally's if people don't know we are a couple, and they question us about our lives on an individual level, they seemed pretty shocked that we are together. It must be the steroids they are on.

And of course, I guess I wouldn't consider the ATL the "tradtional South", as I wouldn't consider Miami the traditional South. But even with that being said, I don't think that Georgia/Alabama/the Carolinas/Tennessee/and all the other Southern places are off my travel list!

Re: Trying to Love the Midwest

[nuncstans]

Honestly, the main reason I didn't just walk out of there was because it took me so long to process the fact that I was being discriminated against for being Jewish. I thought it was because I was young and badly-dressed and that she could tell my opening deposit was going to be $20.