What is wrong with you people?
When I said I was taking a road trip through the Plains and the Rockies, some people asked “Why would you want to do that?”. Others warned me of racists, guns and small minds and who knows what else. Forget that most of these folks have only seen the middle of the country from 30000 feet as they fly coast-to-coast: the mentality was that there was almost no reason to go check out what my Mountain Time Zone brothers are up to, except maybe for a ski vacation.
You might think you’d hear the similar complaints from the citizens of the Rockies – they did after all vote for George Bush, right? What love could they have for us liberal, wine-tasting, Prius-driving snobs? Wrong. Most people were genuinely interested in the goings-on out on the coasts, asking probing questions, and mostly, they just wanted to have a good time with us.
Think twice before you denigrate the “red states”. If you think the differences in our politics mean you can’t enjoy all the people and places around, you are the ones with the small minds.