A Californian in the Midwest
Good evening all!
The Smoking Christian is far more perceptive than even he knows! He asked me how a native Californian can stand real winters, especially Midwest winters. I've been discovered! I might as well come clean. No matter what my younger sisters say, we're not native Californians! Nope! All three of us were born in what has become the ghetto of Flint, Michigan. We packed up the family car and hooked a Nationwide trailer to the back of it and headed down Route 66 to sunny Southern California in August of 1959 when I was almost six years old.
In fact, our first stop wasn't even in the beach city with which we have come to be identified. We spent our first year in a cloud of smog in San Bernadino. You see, Dad was a high school teacher in Michigan. California was being overrun by the second great westward movement and they needed teachers. He posted his resume and began to pray, promising God he would take the first job offered to him. It came from San Bernardino. Dad says that when you live in Flint, MI, any city that has a "San" or a "Santa" in front of it must be beautiful! He should have held out for a city with "beach" in it! Which is where we ended up in 1960. Long Beach. I must have soaked up a lot of beach characteristics in my twelve years in Long Beach because no one ever questioned whether I was a native Californian. When I moved back to the Midwest to go to college everyone was so impressed when I said I was from Long Beach that they never wondered either!
I transferred to Wheaton College as a Junior in October of 1972. Wheaton is a small Christian college, beautifully located in the western suburbs of Chicago. The campus is historic and magnificent! It was football season. I walked from my dorm down to McCully Field to see my first Fighting Crusaders game. (They are no longer the Fighting Crusaders because that name was deemed politically incorrect by some goofs at dear old alma mater. I just can't bring myself to buy a sweatshirt that says "Thunder" on it!) Anyway, the sky was bluer than I had ever seen it. The trees were more colorful than I ever could have imagined. Someone was burning leaves (a smell unmatched on earth!). I fell in love with Fall, a season I had not experienced since I was a little kid.
So how do I stand Midwest winters? Easy! I'm still feeling all warm and fuzzy from Fall! Even the first few snowfalls of Winter are gorgeous! Then I just grit my teeth through March and I'm almost there!
By the way, after church today I came home and turned on the TV to watch the World Baseball Classic. I was pretty excited because the USA was playing Japan in Anaheim Stadium, the home of the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim. The stadium was pretty full of people and I was horrified to see them all wearing coats and gloves. Many were wrapped in blankets. What the heck? My twins were out making chalk drawings on the driveway in their shorts here in beautiful, suburban Caledonia! I watched aghast, waiting for the announcers to say something about the freak weather in SoCal. Sure enough, they said it was 51 degrees at game time! This is only a few miles from the homes of the Smoking Christian and his YB! It was 57 degrees here in Caledonia. This told me something. Southern Californians freeze at 55 degrees while Michiganders put on their shorts and celebrate! See how much happier we are back here? We are so easily amused!
You're all great! Thanks for stopping by.
Shilohman
The Smoking Christian is far more perceptive than even he knows! He asked me how a native Californian can stand real winters, especially Midwest winters. I've been discovered! I might as well come clean. No matter what my younger sisters say, we're not native Californians! Nope! All three of us were born in what has become the ghetto of Flint, Michigan. We packed up the family car and hooked a Nationwide trailer to the back of it and headed down Route 66 to sunny Southern California in August of 1959 when I was almost six years old.
In fact, our first stop wasn't even in the beach city with which we have come to be identified. We spent our first year in a cloud of smog in San Bernadino. You see, Dad was a high school teacher in Michigan. California was being overrun by the second great westward movement and they needed teachers. He posted his resume and began to pray, promising God he would take the first job offered to him. It came from San Bernardino. Dad says that when you live in Flint, MI, any city that has a "San" or a "Santa" in front of it must be beautiful! He should have held out for a city with "beach" in it! Which is where we ended up in 1960. Long Beach. I must have soaked up a lot of beach characteristics in my twelve years in Long Beach because no one ever questioned whether I was a native Californian. When I moved back to the Midwest to go to college everyone was so impressed when I said I was from Long Beach that they never wondered either!
I transferred to Wheaton College as a Junior in October of 1972. Wheaton is a small Christian college, beautifully located in the western suburbs of Chicago. The campus is historic and magnificent! It was football season. I walked from my dorm down to McCully Field to see my first Fighting Crusaders game. (They are no longer the Fighting Crusaders because that name was deemed politically incorrect by some goofs at dear old alma mater. I just can't bring myself to buy a sweatshirt that says "Thunder" on it!) Anyway, the sky was bluer than I had ever seen it. The trees were more colorful than I ever could have imagined. Someone was burning leaves (a smell unmatched on earth!). I fell in love with Fall, a season I had not experienced since I was a little kid.
So how do I stand Midwest winters? Easy! I'm still feeling all warm and fuzzy from Fall! Even the first few snowfalls of Winter are gorgeous! Then I just grit my teeth through March and I'm almost there!
By the way, after church today I came home and turned on the TV to watch the World Baseball Classic. I was pretty excited because the USA was playing Japan in Anaheim Stadium, the home of the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim. The stadium was pretty full of people and I was horrified to see them all wearing coats and gloves. Many were wrapped in blankets. What the heck? My twins were out making chalk drawings on the driveway in their shorts here in beautiful, suburban Caledonia! I watched aghast, waiting for the announcers to say something about the freak weather in SoCal. Sure enough, they said it was 51 degrees at game time! This is only a few miles from the homes of the Smoking Christian and his YB! It was 57 degrees here in Caledonia. This told me something. Southern Californians freeze at 55 degrees while Michiganders put on their shorts and celebrate! See how much happier we are back here? We are so easily amused!
You're all great! Thanks for stopping by.
Shilohman
4 Comments:
Yes, Wheaton, as I remember it, is a beautiful college. It reminded of the Dobbie Gillis Show. It looked so college like, I thought I was on a movie back lot.
I was also impressed by the green there. Beautiful trees. I especially liked all the forest preserves in Illinois.
By the way, to me know, you're a Native Californian if you've been here for fifteen minutes and your feet have had a chance to dry off after running through the river that divides us from Mexico.
A very good post! It's very descriptive. Your blog must be seen by others so I have put a link to it on my blog. Just doing my small part...
Dear Yakimaniac,
I wish I could return the compliment by putting a link for Peter's Ashtray on my web. In fact, if our Church of the SC blogmaster is still out there...Hey! Mooneyslanding! How can I make links for Peter's Ashtray and the Smoking Christian? Well, thanks a lot, Yak! I'll keep trying!
Alas Shilohmensch, as green as the Midwest is in the spring, and as vibrant as the colors of its fall, the present season presents only interminable cold gray flatness. Yet even in this monotonous monochromacy we find a reason to go on. In the words of Garrison Keillor: "Cold weather cheers us up because it strips away some of our illusions that, because we think we ought to be something other than what we are, we feel blue because we aren't that, but cold weather shows us that we couldn't have been anyway so don't worry about it. Cold weather is like a phone call from reality."
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