Tell us about the Real America?

[capt_buzzard]

Originally Posted by anastrophe

a t'rrible beauty

Thats brookfall in County Wicklow

[jwolf7722]

here is my view of america

[capt_buzzard]

I'm waiting,

[telaquapacky]

I grew up in Los Angeles but I left in my early 30's. I have also lived in the (San Francisco) Bay Area. The "Laid back" California image is a myth. Informal, yes, but laid-back- not really. California is a very expensive place to live, and we have to work very hard and be very ambitious to live comfortably. Wearing a Hawaiian shirt or having a hot tub doesn't mean you're laid back. We live by the clock and race everywhere in our cars while talking on our cell phones and eating burritos we bought in a drive-through fast food place that looks a like a miniature spanish mission, all the while burning oceans of gasoline. We pull up the spotless concrete driveways of our manicured, suburban homes and press a button to open our garage doors automatically- giving us no contact with our neighbors except on rare occasions. The thing we don't have is time. So we have very few friends and choose them carefully.

Anastrophe (whom I don't know) lives in Sonoma, which is a far nicer place than Tulare County where I live. He will attest that there is a lot of rivalry between Southern and Northern California. Some of this is because Northern is so much nicer, some because Southern has all the population and is stealing water from the north. Central is both deservedly and undeservedly lumped together with Southern (they're taking our water too).

After a seven and a half year stint in Africa, I moved to the Central Coast, in San Luis Obispo. The California coast is so beautiful there and the towns so quaint and arty, the people who live there think they are superior. They don't act conceited or unfriendly, but they think they are the luckiest people on the earth. Below the surface, you find many of them live in fear that their jobs will change or something will happen that will cause them to have to leave, or that their children will not find work and will have to live far away, and they are unhappy about people moving in and bringing more development and traffic. The cost of housing there has doubled in the past five years. It's a touristy paradise where there is a lot of stress boiling just under the surface.

Then I lived in Bakersfield in California's central valley, a flat, arid desert turned into an agricultural wonder by shipping water around. It produces 60% of America's agricultural output. It's cold in the winter and very hot and dry in the summer, and stays hot at night. People in L.A. and S.F. look down on Bakersfield like it's some hick cow town (In some minor ways it is- which I considered an improvement). But very unlike the bigger cities, housing in Bakersfield is very affordable, and because it's growing fast and developers are competitive, new houses are well built, well landscaped and stylish. People who move to the Central Valley from L.A. sell their little, crowded together, worn-out crackerbox houses on streets lined with cars for half a million dollars, and move into a magazine-photo-spread lifestyle for just over two hundred thousand. Meanwhile, farmland disappears. Better acquire an appetite for concrete, wood and stucco, because there will be fewer apples.

My work took me from Bakersfield to an even smaller town, population about ten thousand. I'm surrounded, not by urban crowding, but by hundreds of thousands of acres of orange, nut tree and olive orchards, dairies, farms and ranches. I'm 45 minutes from the gate of one of Amerca's most beautiful national parks, Sequoia, in the Sierra Nevada mountains. But my life is not very different from what it was in L.A. Ha ha. I doubt California is the real America.

[A Karenina]

The real America? Wow...tall order there

I grew up in a small agricultural town in Georgia. The whole small town hype is very true...more churches than gas stations, but also more churches than prisons. At least so far! Everybody does know everyone else's business but they also help each other out when times get tough. Family life, hard work, good manners, and respect for the elderly was what I brought with me when I left...plus a secret family recipe for the best iced tea.

My next stop was Chicago. Interesting place. I hated it. (I'm laughing but it's true.) Noisy, dirty, fast, and incredibly rude. More bars than churches. Lots of experiences, though. The food was awesome and I still miss it. There was always something happening from theatre to art exhibits to the best live blues I've ever heard. Sports addicts would love Chicago. The whole mafia thing still goes on - it's easy enough to live with, you just don't let anyone do favors for you. The city is very much alive. I just had a lot of trouble adjusting from the quiet south to the busy in-your-face midwest.

I now live in Oregon. It is some of the most gorgeous country I've ever seen. The people are laid-back in that they are truly ok with you doing your own thing. The food is not very good, but they have some awesome beer here. The people don't hold the same work ethic that Georgia and Chicago holds. Oddly, I find myself being scolded for working too hard. I get annoyed from time to time with the casual pace, but overall I really love the people and the place. Also, the population seems very concerned with politics, and Oregonians are up-to-date on current events (on the whole).

My next stop is unknown - perhaps Vermont.

Not sure if that helps paint any kind of picture for you.

[Angiepangie]

The real America is such a hard thing to define though, isn't it? There's as much distance between, say, DC and LA as there is between London and Cairo. Therefore, across the country and states, and between rural and urban, there must be some marked differences.

I find there's an opinion of Americans in my country that stems from who your president is (not good at the moment folks) , what we see on our TVs and in our cinemas and the tourists we get in London and other cities. These things cannot give a true picture.

[Hopalong]

Hi Angie

Welcome

That is a most difficult request. Imagine yourself trying to describe the real England.

I can contribute this much :
I think its fair to say that what is shown on US TV is mostly rubbish and is largely crafted keep you watching long enough to expose you to the commercial drival
that they hope will get you to part with your money. In the end, I am not sure anyone can adequately describe the "real America " because it is made up of so many different life styles and diverse people. Many of us have an idea of what we like to believe is the real America and hopefully some of that will be posted to you here. Good luck with your request.

[capt_buzzard]

Its very interesting reading your posts. Real Americans are not really bad guys at all Thanks,

[telaquapacky]

We puts on our trousers one leg at a time, just like you

[capt_buzzard]

Some folk here believe that there are still the old Western America, like Walton's Mountain and Willow Creek?