It is an issue, that where I come from, transcends politics, race and creed. In fact, to even call it an issue would be a vast over-simplification. It cuts to the heart of who we are. I’ve heard them described as “salt of the earth” and never really understood fully what that meant. It was always used as a positive, but with some underlying condescension. Implying perhaps that they are simple people, but if this is the case, then the bestowers of this term are missing at least a few layers of complexity to these people who inhabit my undulating portion of southwestern Wisconsin known as the Driftless region.
Karl Jung wrote about the duality of man, being some sort of give and take between a human’s own personality and broad archetypes that are present in the world around us. To me, the duality of man is the member of a hippie commune owning more hunting rifles than the average NRA republican, or a Ron Paul bumper sticker next to a “think globally, act locally” bumper sticker; in short, the not always logical amalgamation of communitarian and libertarian ideals. This confluence of ideals is something about the driftless region that stirs me to my core and makes my hair stand on end with excitement. It could be even something more, an innate majesty, something akin to a chemical reaction that occurs when both the land and the people are in the same place.
Maybe this is a manifestation of the psychological phenomenon Jung is talking about. People identifying as much with the rugged and self-reliant frontiersman as they do with the tree hugging, Woodstock flower-child. This duality is obviously present to varying degrees in different people, but the main point is that these people are not the boring, wholesome ‘salt of the earth’ type that the Midwest as a whole is typified to be.
These communities within the larger Driftless community have their faults, oft criticized by their hip and passive youth for not being a stimulating enough environment. In some ways they are right, but they also fail to objectively appreciate the uniqueness of the social ecosystem they are a part of, which is entirely understandable. I remember taking it for granted in a similar manner, scoffing at the eccentricity and sincerity of it all. It seemed to me to be the norm. Little did I know that people are not made like this everywhere.
This is not the boring corn row after corn row of Iowa and Illinois. This is a land littered with icy slopes, cold springs, Tibetan peace flags, and bullet-hole riddled stop signs.
This is why whenever work-and-travelers look at me with that cynical gleam of understanding when I tell them I am an American, I greet their gleam with a wink and a smile of confusion, as if to say “You know me as well as Icarus knew the sun. Let’s talk about life.”
Previously published on Flashnews.com
