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Rural Saskatchewan
Jul. 18th, 2002 10:04 pmIt's one of those things you don't think on. It's just what you're used to, where you grew up.
The weird things aren't weird to you.
Take last night, for example. Severe thunderstorm and tornado warnings. Golfball sized hail and funnel cloud sighting. It missed us by a couple of kilometres. They were kayaking in intersections up in the city. All we got was high winds that blew the screen right off the window and across the room to smack me in the head.
Some one told me that people coming to Saskatchewan are awed by the sense of space. It's not just that it's flat, because we have lots of hills. They're just very, very small hills. The first time I saw the foothills (Read: Less than two years ago) I thought that they were the mountains. There's something in the way the sky reaches down for the horizon on a hot day, how this arc just ends above the crops. I live twenty five minutes by truck from the nearest town, and almost an hour from Saskatoon, which is about as big a centre as you get. I've passed through a couple of larger ones: Stayed in them once or twice. We were in Edmonton's business district and I was rubber necking like nothing else. I'd never seen buildings that tall before, and I'm assured that there are ones much, much taller.
I'm used to being able to drive for an hour or more without seeing a single soul. I'm used to weather that fluctuates between -70 C and +40C, windchill and humidex. I've never smelled smog or gone to a school where I couldn't give you the first and last names of everyone from K-12, and one important fact about them - My entire grade has around 20 kids, collected from two towns, two settlements, the valley, the military base, and all the farms falling into the jurisdiction. You have two choices of classes: Industrial Arts/Home Ec, and Media20/Creative Writing20. You take everything else, but they have a backing for higher maths because most people drop them, and there's nothing to do in town that's not destructive. Most people start drinking before they hit grade 9, and if you're going out with someone it means that they asked you, and you hang around together at school, and stumble off into the bushes at parties. If you have stalkers, you cannot avoid them. And if you don't get along with your sister, then you can't avoid the things she makes up about you. On the flip side, however - Since people know you, they usually realize she's just being a bitch.
Saskatchewan has the highest per capita crime rate in the country, and the most restaurants per capita in the entire world. You're not exactly pushed to seek higher education, especially if you're a girl, and you have to work your butt off to prove yourself in shop class. Your classmates often miss school during hunting season because they're out killing things, either with their folks, or their folk's blessing. You spend a lot of time avoiding hitting various forms of wildlife with your car, and you get used to the idea of people keeping cows in their backyards.
You laugh a lot; and you get so incredibly mad when people play with their lives out of boredom, because these people are all your friends; and you fight a lot, but you learn to get along with everyone, because it's not like you can avoid them.
The weird things aren't weird to you.
Take last night, for example. Severe thunderstorm and tornado warnings. Golfball sized hail and funnel cloud sighting. It missed us by a couple of kilometres. They were kayaking in intersections up in the city. All we got was high winds that blew the screen right off the window and across the room to smack me in the head.
Some one told me that people coming to Saskatchewan are awed by the sense of space. It's not just that it's flat, because we have lots of hills. They're just very, very small hills. The first time I saw the foothills (Read: Less than two years ago) I thought that they were the mountains. There's something in the way the sky reaches down for the horizon on a hot day, how this arc just ends above the crops. I live twenty five minutes by truck from the nearest town, and almost an hour from Saskatoon, which is about as big a centre as you get. I've passed through a couple of larger ones: Stayed in them once or twice. We were in Edmonton's business district and I was rubber necking like nothing else. I'd never seen buildings that tall before, and I'm assured that there are ones much, much taller.
I'm used to being able to drive for an hour or more without seeing a single soul. I'm used to weather that fluctuates between -70 C and +40C, windchill and humidex. I've never smelled smog or gone to a school where I couldn't give you the first and last names of everyone from K-12, and one important fact about them - My entire grade has around 20 kids, collected from two towns, two settlements, the valley, the military base, and all the farms falling into the jurisdiction. You have two choices of classes: Industrial Arts/Home Ec, and Media20/Creative Writing20. You take everything else, but they have a backing for higher maths because most people drop them, and there's nothing to do in town that's not destructive. Most people start drinking before they hit grade 9, and if you're going out with someone it means that they asked you, and you hang around together at school, and stumble off into the bushes at parties. If you have stalkers, you cannot avoid them. And if you don't get along with your sister, then you can't avoid the things she makes up about you. On the flip side, however - Since people know you, they usually realize she's just being a bitch.
Saskatchewan has the highest per capita crime rate in the country, and the most restaurants per capita in the entire world. You're not exactly pushed to seek higher education, especially if you're a girl, and you have to work your butt off to prove yourself in shop class. Your classmates often miss school during hunting season because they're out killing things, either with their folks, or their folk's blessing. You spend a lot of time avoiding hitting various forms of wildlife with your car, and you get used to the idea of people keeping cows in their backyards.
You laugh a lot; and you get so incredibly mad when people play with their lives out of boredom, because these people are all your friends; and you fight a lot, but you learn to get along with everyone, because it's not like you can avoid them.