It's Electric

I was recently quite surprised and intrigued to hear that a lovely young friend of mine had moved to a farm out West - just up and moved states like it was nothing.

Shocking.

She moved States; not houses, apartments, or even cities - STATES. One day she's in Utah, the next she's parked on the shoulder looking at a map of California in a Honda Civic loaded with clothes, skis and a frying pan.

Things are different out there.

I was further surprised to learn that her NEW home (described as a "cabin") has no electicity. My first question was: "did your first house HAVE electricity?" She gave me a blank look and said "Of course Jimmy! Gah!"

My mistake.

Generally, I think of people with no electricity GETTING electricty, not the other way around; but what do I know? I never went to highschool.

I do know that "no electricity" means when you flip a light switch - exactly nothing happens. The cable is always out. The internet is always down. The hairdryer never blows hot enough. In short: N.O. E.L.E.C.T.R.I.C.I.T.Y.

Don't have the right converter for your ipod? No problem. Carve whatever you want into the log wall and plug it right in - its all the same. If you want to catch Dexter on Sunday nights you have to drive 2hrs to a town, wander around until you spot a house with a tv tuned to Dexter, and watch it through their living room window.

I hope you're a lipreader, but even so: popcorn popped on top of a hot muffler does not remind me of my childhood.

Thinking on my feet, the only thing I could reasonably respond to her bit of news was "Oh. Well. how much marijuana" are you growing?" in a very jovial tone.

"Twenty five plants" she said.

You could have knocked me over with a rolling paper.

Oh yes. The term "farm" in California (I learned) means "licensed marijuana-growing-facility."

We don't license that here in Georgia. Why? Because, obviously, you go to hell for growing what the state has determined to be "naughty" plants. Everybody here knows that and we're fine with it because our legislature is never, ever wrong.

More importantly though, how do you bring yourself to bail on your home state? I couldn't do it myself; mostly because I believe Florida, Alabama, Tennessee, and South Carolina are just the leftover pieces of Georgia that we didn't really want and all the rest is a vast epanse of untamed nothingness; but also because my sense of state-identity dictates that I consider all other states in the union "generally terrible."

Georgia is, as I'm sure you know, God's Country.

I was made to live here. I can get from Atlanta to Albany using only neighborhood streets and Wal-Mart parking lots. I belong, but chances are good you don't. Its getting crowded as it is, so if you moved here recently - try California instead, they need good farmers out there.