A very merry Christmas from Wisconsin!

By some miracle, I arrived home on Tuesday, despite a beautiful display of frozen precipitation in Milwaukee, and will be here for another three days before heading back to the East Coast. Needless to say, I am Rather Excited about being back in the Midwest. It's funny - I could have pointed out a few cultural differences between Midwest and East Coast after moving to NY, but it took being plunged back into my culture of origin for me to realize how truly different the two places are. 

For one, Midwesterners talk so much! After a relatively silent flight from LaGuardia to Detroit (I swear, the only person talking was the 6 year-old next to me, who kept looking out the window at the clouds and asking which one was God), I was downright shocked when I boarded my plane to Milwaukee and found thirty total strangers jovially conversing as though they'd known each other all their lives. What? Talk to strangers? Unheard of, at least in the city of inhuman automatons!

Then there's the bit where everyone is polite. It appears that, despite my best efforts to maintain my Midwestern manners, the New York ethos has, in fact, rubbed off on me. I think it's a survival of the fittest thing - if you politely wait your turn in Manhattan, you'll never accomplish anything. You have to push and shove your way to the front of the line. Not so in WI. A few days ago, I was doing some pre-Christmas grocery shopping, and was exasperated with a woman who was dawdling and blocking the entire aisle with her cart. So I did the logical thing - I pushed. I shoved. The woman looked up at me with total consternation - not as though she was offended, but as though she was genuinely bewildered that anyone would behave in such a brutish manner - and said, "...oh, I'm sorry...did you want me to move?" Embarassingly enough, the thought of asking hadn't even occurred to me. It was kind of a revelation. And lets not even discuss the aggressive influence the New Jerseyans have had on my driving...I am heartily ashamed. 

So, good citizens of WI, I hope that you will pardon my unknowingly acquired East Coast mannerisms during my short stay here. I am all too delighted to consume your beer, rejoice in your unique pronunciation of vowels, drink from your bubblers, and play in your snow for a few more days. Cheers, and Merry Christmas!