I just got back from a week in North Dakota, spending time in Grand Forks, Adams/Fairdale, and Fargo.  It’s a cold place, but a good one.  I wrote a little something upon return.

Ode to North Dakota
To you, O North Dakota
how so you make my toes hurt-a,
but you’re good people and fine by me.
Without gloves and jacket (and scarf and fleece and flannel and ear muffs)
some would say you’re inhospitable,
but really, you’re just distinguished in an unassuming manner.

No, you, O North Dakota,
are about kindness, and ease, and prudent reflection.
You like the outdoors — shooting things, but respecting them too.
You love four wheel drive vehicles, but mostly to pull others out of the ditch because that’s just the nice thing to do.
More than half your conversation is about the weather,
but who’s to judge.  Uff dah.
Yeah, you betcha.

Lutherans abound like ice on the road.

Oh, I suppose, you tire of being the butt of jokes.
About your beautiful summer — the one weekend of it.
About Ole and Lena — the greatest couple that never lived.
About the farm and the homeland and “Midwestern nice.”  Uff.

But truly, really, friend-to-friend, honestly speaking,
you are an unappreciated bastion of decency.
A forgotten prairie of cold flat goodness.
A declining population of people, not deer.

Your economy is strong.
You fret over the whopping two murders –statewide– last year.
Sure your politics are corrupt, but who’s aren’t these days?
And your governor is the most popular around (save Palin, but she can have her spotlight; that’s just not like you.)

O to you, North Dakota,
land of plenty and ice,
land of snow and funsies,
big sky, big hearts, careful, determined, measured decent delight.

Sadly, one only gets 7 hits when googling “Ode to North Dakota.”  Here’s two of the best: Barberland, and Lorraine Weible.  But come on folks, let’s up that number!