Waiting for the Tour Boat at WI Dells, sitting in intense heat on a blue and gold day, one couple from New York, another couple from the Wisconsin North woods, and myself, talking small things.

            “I was in New York once,” says the elderly Northwoods lady.  “Where we live, at home, I pull up in front of the pharmacy on bright sunny days, leave the windows down, the car unlocked, go in for prescriptions.  I went to a pharmacy in New York once.  I parked my car lengthwise along the building, unlocked, windows down . . . it was hot.  The man behind the counter said, you know, in his little “man-behind-the-counter authority” ‘Mam, you can’t park there!  Within two minutes there won’t be anything left of your car for the cop to write you a parking ticket for.  And you’re making it hard for other customers to park.”

            We laugh and the North woods husband says “I was driving a truck in northern Kentucky in the country once, looking for a warehouse where I was supposed to pick up a trailer of empty whiskey bottles.  I asked directions from a man I see getting into his car, turns out he’s a local business owner in the industrial park.  Not only did he give me direction but offered to let me follow him in his car to the warehouse.  Well, he didn’t know where he was going either but he climbed in my truck and for two hours rode with me until we found the warehouse.  I couldn’t believe it.  Couldn’t even give ‘em a dime, his pleasure it was.  Just to reflect on geography on people.”

            “That’s why we’re always quick to say we’re from upper New York,” says the other husband.  “I grew up on a farm.  Dad died when I was fourteen.  We couldn’t keep her goin’.  Real tough being’ a farmer these days anyways.  So I went to college, first one in my family.”