Posts from 10,000 ft: missing Mississippi?

The view from way up here

From my cramped, middle-seat in row 42, without even the distractions of free wifi ($6/hr is $6 too much.  Take note, Delta), I'm doing my best to appreciate the fact that I am flying through the air at 100's of miles an hour. So far, I'm unsuccessful.

But I'm no less happy for it, I managed to hop on the standby list for an earlier flight (for free!) and got out of Atlanta an hour and a half earlier than scheduled. So now, at this moment, instead of inching along the tarmac in Atlanta, I'm sailing over the bright, golden-hazy meadows of Oklahoma.  

Since, relatively speaking, I'm not going anywhere, I thought I'd talk a bit about Mississippi.

See?  Boring. 

I'll open with a confession: I get bored in Mississippi.  A lot of people asked me why I went home for such short time.  There were a lot of good reasons–I needed to finish up projects in Provo; it was hundreds of dollars cheaper to fly christmas and new years eves; and I wanted time to come back, work on things in Provo and get ready for the school semester. A big part of it was just habit: for a long time I've had very limited time for vacations because of the MTC, so this Christmas, even though I had fewer obligations, it felt strange to leave for more than a week–but a lot of it came down to the fact that I always get bored when I stay in Mississippi for too long. I miss the near-constant adventures available in Utah.

That said, this last week was lovely.  I think this last year I mellowed out a bit and realized that I actually enjoy a lot of things about Mississippi and being home that I've never really appreciated.  Here's a little shout out to my home state.  It may have problems with obesity, poverty, education, and teen pregnancy, but it's not for nothing that profound people come out of Mississippi.

There are also no dogs in Provo

When I was younger, whenever we would go to Utah, when we came back my parents would always talk about how Mississippi was "So green!!". I never saw what was so fantastic about the greenness.  Now when I come home I love how the entire state is alive.  Everywhere you look, there are trees and bushes and vines and life.  There are squirrels and birds and bugs everywhere. Everything is slightly damp and smells like life.  Everything breathes.

Mississippi might not be a popular destination for carefree, outdoorsy europeans and asian tour busses (although it might, they always seem to pop up in the strangest places), but its outdoors are somewhat wonderful.  Open water kayaking is fantastic, and walks in the woods have this private, secluded, even romantic (in the truest sense of the word) feel that is hard to find in the exposed, oft-overcrowded wilderness of Utah. You can turn a corner in the woods and find yourself with no human in earshot. It's really the best type of solitude.

Here we see Perkes in its natural habitat

There was a time when I thought snow was the most magical thing in the world and I could play in it forever and never get bored.  Admittedly, that was last Sunday, but the more time I spend in Utah, the more I appreciate winters that aren't quite so frigid.  It is wonderful to stand barefoot in the gulf, or walk through the woods in a t-shirt (having fallen into the water from a tree of dubious integrity), or simply go outside without gearing up for war.

In regards to the people, I might just be projecting, but I feel like everyone here, myself included, is a lot less high-strung. It's sort of hard to judge this, because I live in a stressful college town, and my parents live on the beach in a casino town, but I think it's a fair observation.  People in the south just take time to talk to people or to sit.  I think that's the reason there are so many porches in Mississippi compared to Utah. (I don't actually know if this is true, but I suspect it is.  When I have internet again I'll look this up.) The one time we tried to get a porch in Utah the Home Owners' Association threatened to fine us.  Why?  Because they hate relaxation.

Crepes for lunch

Returning to Mississippi, you wouldn't know if from how skinny healthy everyone in my family is, but we do food right.  Eating my parents cooking is great, and the bagels and cream cheese flow like water from the tap (and unlike tap-water in Mississippi, bagels and cream cheese are delicious).  Actually my family does everything I love right.  We play games, we cook fancy meals, we talk about science, we go outside, we watch Doctor Who.  It's very reassuring.

So I really enjoyed this week, and being in Mississippi.
I'm not saying I'd like to build a summer home here, but the trees are actually quite lovely.