Fall has come to Northern Minnesota. The time of contemplation and renewal where I get a gentle reminder of my gender deficiencies. I'm not talking hormones or weak biceps... firearm deer hunting season is almost here...where groups of men will descend on our town.
Next Friday begins the giant calvade of guns and bad clothes in this sleepy community of 7,764 people. Each year approximately 500,000 hunters harvest 200,000 deer in our fine state...for us that means beer goes on sale, pop prices go up and deer hunter widow events begin to happen at the Judy Garland room or The Sawmill Inn.
I interview authors for a living, and a year ago or so I was on the phone getting the spiel from another book publicity person. Her book was a new and innovative take on traffic. She talked on and on about the average commute travel time and the alarming new trend of increased suburb-to-suburb commutes. When she finished she used her pr techniques to engage me in conversation.
"How is traffic where you are?!!?"
I really wasn't trying to be quaint or Minnesotan in my answer. I just said what came to my mind.
"Oh not too bad. I mean, at 3 o'clock you don't want to go over by the civic center or the fairgrounds because the kids are getting out of school - and 38 gets tough to cross, 'specially at the four-way stop if you are trying to get to Ogle's.
She said nothing.
I continued, "Oh, and opening hunting and fishing weekends are REALLY bad!"
There was so much silence on the end of the line that I can't really explain it. It wasn't so much that there wasn't noise, there was almost a sucking of noise out of her big city cubicle.
She laughed and laughed and laughed and laughed some more and asked if she could tell her coworkers. I told her sure, as long as I could tell mine.
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