I left North Dakota for a lot of good reasons. Pretty much everything I wanted in life, especially back when only Al Gore had the Internet, was in a major metropolitan area; a place to try to be a songwriter, a musician, a writer, or something just different than I could be back in one of the most rural states in the US.
And that judgment was largely right, then and now. I found opportunity in the big city that would have eluded me back in the rural west, then and, let’s be honest, now. I’d have never fallen out of college into a major market talk radio job; I’d have never tripped into either of the careers I’ve had since then; nothing that is my life today had I stayed in North Dakota, other than faith and family – and my family is mostly here, too.
And for better or worse, that’s the way it’s going to be for at least the next five years. I was working remotely – at least for a while – before it was cool; from 2015 through most of 2017 I worked from home. And it was great. But when the jobs ended – and they did – the immutable fact is, being where the work was, having a network and a presence and a reputation among a critical-enough mass of people in the industry to find the next job was pretty much non-negotiable.
So the ties that bind me to the big city are emotional, financial and personal.
Oh, yeah – and I’m stubborn. I may eventually walk away from the city, to someplace in Minnesota with a functional two-party system, or across the river to solid, competent, red Northwest Wisconsin. But I’ll do it on my own time. I won’t run away from the mob, either on the street or in city hall. Not if I can help it.
So I’ve got my reasons for being here, and I’m fine with that.
Still, I brought a little bit of my home here. North Dakotans are famously stoic, and calmly but ruthlessly pragmatic – and it shows in the way the state governs itself. And, to be honest, it did, mostly, even when the state’s governor and its congressional delegation were longtime Democrats – although the likes of George Skinner and Byron Dorgan and Kent Conrad would look like Barry Goldwater in the modern Democratic Party; Collin Peterson is as close as you’ll find in the wild today. And I compare the public life of my “new” home of 30-odd years to my old one, and find it grossly wanting. Perhaps the lower population density means that there’s noplace to escape the wrath of an angry populace; perhaps the more modest budget for a permanent political and non-profit class means that politicians of all stripes need to mind their manners, since they are unlikely to wind up in permanent political sinecures. More than a few former governors in the Dakotas and Montana went back into private legal practice after leaving office; perhaps knowing they were going to be back on Main Street one day tempers behavior in a way that looking forward to a “teaching” job at the Humphrey Center and a cushy and largely ceremonial “job” at a law firm or non-profit doesn’t. And I suspect it’ll take a genuine catastrophe – not the twin, training-wheels problems, Covid and the Floyd Riots – to strip away enough of the surplus wealth that enables rot-enabling dross like our non-profit/industrial complex and academic complexes to thrive. And that’s a level of catastrophe that will make Governor Walz’s original models look pollyannaish – a serious epidemic, like aerosol Ebola or a reawakened Bubonic Plague; rioting with guns instead of spray paint.
And let’s hope it doesn’t come to that.
I’ve got a fair number of people in my metro social circle who are making active noises about moving to the rural west. South Dakota is a current favorite – Governor Noem has distinguished herself in leading SoDak through the Covid crisis to the point where there’s talk of her being, unthinkably, a national contender. (In a just world, Governor Burgum of North Dakota would be a legitimate contender as well – but being a billionaire and by all indications pretty dang happy where he’s at, he’d have no reason to want to). I ask, mostly in fun, “you have two Dakotas to choose from, and you pick that one?”, but I get it…
…mostly.
My next question is absolutely serious: “Go to South Dakota…and do what?” If you’ve got a career that’s genuinely portable and can exist anywhere – or no career at all, and able to start over from rock bottom – then that makes sense. If you earn your living via the many, many parts of the economy that only occur in metro areas larger than 250,000 (and Fargo makes the cut, more or less, batting well above its weight economically – but it’s also developed its own class of “progressive” useless mouths, and along with Grand Forks the state’s only real collection of institutional Democrats), you may be looking long and hard to find a way to make ends meet. And if you’re counting on your remote job to carry you through – check those connections, both on the Internet and on your LinkedIn. You’d best have a very high profile in your industry to be able to find your next job from your den in Aberdeen.
Still, for all the Metro governments have poured into the bogus, politically-correct, perverted-to-the-point-of-Orwellian definition of “resiliency”, Victor Davis Hanson reminds us in his meditations on Æsop’s fable of the City Mouse and Country Mouse that life in the more rural areas offers the real thing – the ability to provide one’s own “safety net” far more resilient than that of even a well-intentioned social one, a genuine community.
And there are times that sounds attractive.
If you don’t need the trappings of city life the Dakotas are a beautiful place to live. There are the winters to deal with though, not unlike any where in the upper mid-west.
I grew up in a town so small, we didn’t have any racial or religious minorities, our big cultural divide was between Catholics and two flavors of Lutherans. When we heard popping noises at night, we could safely assume it was fireworks and were jealous of whoever it was, shooting them off.
I thought I need the big city attractions but it turns out, I never go to museums or nightclubs. I can see the game better on TV than in the stands. I shop at Wal-Mart, Cub Foods, Home Depot and Amazon, and they’re everywhere.
My son bought a house the same vintage and style as mine, but in a suburb. His taxes are HALF of mine and the city promptly plows his street in the winter.
Why am I still here?
I grew up in Saint Paul and moved to the burbs as soon as my oldest reached school age.
It was not far enough.
While in high school, my son fell victim to the toxic culture of suburban mega-schools, so I made the wisest decision of my life by rebooting his social life and moving to a burg fifty miles from The Cities. It worked. He made great lifelong friends and is in business with one of them today.
I commuted for awhile and then moved back to a small condo in the burbs, once my kids graduated. We couldn’t stand it, so we bought a house and ten acres down by the Iowa border near my wife’s hometown.
She got a job there but I stayed at work in The Cities, living in the condo and returning home on weekends.
My boss let me telecommute for weeks at a time and everyone benefited, because my productivity was through the roof – but then came a new boss who refused to let me work at home.
I gave my notice.
Now everyone in that office telecommutes.
I hope if there is anything good about Covid, it will be the return of the economy to the burgs and small towns where life is affordable, safe and free from toxic culture.
25+ years ago, I was informed I was going to be a father; didn’t know much about the job but I did know I wasn’t gonna do it in the shithole California was on the way to becoming (never in my wildest dreams could I have imagined just how bad it was gonna get).
I had done a job at 3M the year before, it was my first and only time setting foot in MN. I was impressed with the fact that driving North out of Maplewood for no more than 10 miles, I was in the country (or so it seemed to me, having grown up in a concrete jungle). Didn’t know anyone, had no job prospects but it had to be better than Castro Valley, so we sold the house, bought a moving truck, packed everything we had that would fit, gave away stuff that wouldn’t (a mill, lathe and 2 motorcycles) and hit the road.
Bought a little 15 ac hobby farm in Oak Grove and went hunting for work. The job I landed (managing a welding shop and designing equipment for coating expanded metal with plastisol) was nothing I had done before, but designing the equipment led me to automation; Boom! a new career was born.
I started to realize the shithole MN was on the way to becoming (never in my wildest dreams could I have imagined just how bad it was gonna get), so I looked for a job in the deep Red South and left MN in 2012. True, this time I had a job to start when I got here, but the company was aquired in 2017 and our department was laid off. No matter. I formed an LLC, started contracting and have been covered up with work since the first week.
I have a steady gig with a multi-national, but am not tied to them. I’m essentially free, surrounded by friendly, like minded people and happier than ever. Taking the risk of heading off into the unknown has paid off for me; I recommend it.
Apart from a detail or two, my situation pretty much mirrored yours Greg.
One thing I found over the years prior to the ascendance of telecommuting is that regardless of price, “gas” (the price of driving) is always less than real estate. But now the prevalence of telecommuting pretty much seals the deal.
If you don’t need the trappings of city life the Dakotas are a beautiful place to live
They are.
But economic opportunity (for me) is a big “trapping”.
Why cities?
At one time they were an efficient way of connecting workers and employers. These days the justification is that a wide network of real and potential acquaintances creates economic opportunities for workers, employers, entrepreneurs, and financers. These opportunities are diminished in rural areas and small towns.
How’s that working out these days?
Next week I will be flying to MSP. On the way I have a 7 hour layover in LA. I am dreading it. The few people I have spoken with who have traveled recently tell me that the LA scene is very weird, and that LAX is crowded with mostly young people taking advantage of cheap seats & perceived covid-19 immunity.
I hope if there is anything good about Covid, it will be the return of the economy to the burgs and small towns where life is affordable, safe and free from toxic culture.
Don’t you worry. The libturds will not stand for this and will exercise everything in their power to maintain control by taking over, annexing, swallowing the burgs so they can continue to shove their toxic culture down your throat. Do you really think they will allow their slaves to escape the plantation? Fuck this is depressing!
Oh, and I am so glad we moved away from that frozen hell that is MN down to TX. Yes, at that time, 2015, weather was the main factor for health reasons. But the Kalifornians are moving in, just look at Austin. Good thing even dumbocRat lib city goobernment knows better than to mess with Texas.
Kalifornians are moving in, just look at Austin
jpa, they arrived in the 90’s with the semi-conductor boom. Austin is know as “Silicon Gulch”. I was working for RPC in Chaska at the time programming and commissioning chemical delivery systems in semi-conductor wafer fab’s; had an apartment in Austin on 3rd St. while we did a multi year project at the Motorola R&D fab (also did work at Texas Instruments) good times!
But then, I started noticing the people I was running into in town were the same goddamned Cali people I had run from years earlier. Really bummed me out because I knew it was the end for a great town…and it was.
justplainangry;
Yea, I lived in Houston, but San Antonio and Austin were part of my territory. I loved the Hill Country and before our kids came along, we spent a couple of Oktoberfests in New Braunfels. I did like Austin then, but looking back, I wasn’t paying much attention to politics. That is until I met my Congressman, Tom DeLay. He shared his concern that the state was moving harder to the left and that was in 1987. Of course, as I have mentioned here before, Houston was pretty much already gone.
I can thank North Dakota for one thing. The cold, windy winters kept me from becoming an aircraft mechanic. My career in sales has been successful beyond what the dreams of a middle class kid with no college degree could have imagined. I actually did have fun there though. While taking some courses at UND, I met some fraternity guys from TKE House and they made me an honorary member. This helped me score with some pretty hot young ladies, one of whom, I thought I would end up marrying. Women in Grand Forks had a love/hate relationship with us “Basers”. Although Airman didn’t make much money, we did have more than most college boys and were willing to spend it on them.
I used to cover South Dakota for a couple of my sales gigs. I love Sioux Falls and actually have friends there and in Worthington, MN, so that would be a place that I would strongly consider moving to.
MP, congrats on your retirement! I usually make it up there couple times a year on business (and my kids are still there), I’ll holler at you next time and we’ll hook up in WI for a Spotted Cow.
Hoss, word on the street is Worthington is thoroughly infested with Somali slags.
” and largely ceremonial “job” at a law firm or non-profit “
Walter Mondale is Senior Partner at Dorsey & Whitney largely because he brought his personnel files and his Rolodex with him. People take his calls – thats his total net worth to the firm.
“Go to South Dakota…and do what?”
Sioux Falls is finance/banking if software is your garden (but it is a small plot)
otherwise its Agriculture, or the hospitality industry. The increasing automation of farm implements is a growth industry in Agriculture but you need depth in robotics and satellite technology services to play in that field.
If NW WI is a destination buy the acres you want and make the “improvements you want now – more and more Boomers from the twin cities are retiring there and bringing their urban/suburban notions about zoning with them.
I grew up in Edina as a “poor kid” because my parents didn’t have a membership to the Edina Country Club. I grew up middle class as they come but due to my job I’ve spent the last few years in Minneapolis and I can’t wait to get out of this miserable city to the suburbs, maybe the exurbs. I have found that I tend to like rural people more than city people but I like being kinda close to the cities, for sports mostly.
Trump has the right idea. Drain the swamp by scattering government to the hinterlands.
If the Republicans ever get the state back, we should do the same. Send MNPCA to Winona, Education to Duluth, Public Safety to Albert Lea and the Department of Revenue to Mankato.
And yeah, send the Department of Health to South Dakota. Maybe they will learn something there.
But oh noes, the bureaucrats will cry, “we have to meet to coordinate!”
Best that they don’t.
POD
as Exurbs go some friends of mine bought a 5 acre plot/house (<$128k) outside Cambridge 25 years ago and commuted to jobs in TC. Depending upon where they worked they had 3 main routes to work Hwy 47 (Univ ave), Hwy 65, or I-35. Their commute times to work were often shorter than when they lived in St Paul and worked in Eden Prairie.
Sorry there, Greg, Albert Lea was an officer with the Confederacy. Better to move Public Safety office to Austin instead.
Chopper,
Yea, you’re correct. There’s a poultry processing plant near there.
Oh, it’s pretty simple. Remove all the tax deductions associated with non-profits and they’ll collapse down to something manageable. Or force the trusts to spend all their money in 25 years and it’d kill non-profits. Either of those changes would kill non-profits, but since that’s where politicians go to retire, I doubt we can do it.
Welcome to Wisconsin. Now watch what Minnesota taxes will still do to your income and cry. Still, my property taxes are lower and I don’t have an insane mayor encouraging idiots to destroy my area, so I think I made a good tradeoff.
I haven’t noticed much. But on the other hand, I’m farther out than right next to the border so maybe I’m not seeing it as much. Out where I am they’ve UPed the minimum size of the lot to keep more of them durn MN furriners from clutterin’ up the place. For some reason they want developments, so we’re making ’em impossible in my township.
Or consider NE Wisconsin. Spent a week there a couple years ago in and around Presque Isles. Wooded and remote, with a lot of small towns chained together. Really pretty. Get you a truck and a snow-mobile and you can go anywhere. Not totally free from politics, though. Our hosts said they never went into “town” any more if they could help it. “F*ing politics will drive you crazy.”
Nerd
for decades where I am the smallest lot you could buy was 10 acres but in the last 4 years there is a push to reduce that to 5, 2, & 1 acre plots and to permit multi unit developments. Polk Cty saw a big push in the last 2 years to rewrite the property zoning ordinances to “foster sustainability and recognize climate change” while enabling “affordable” development. They didn’t get all they wanted but there is a new list of things you can’t do with your property without their approval..
Gulp!! 🙂
NW, wouldn’t NE ‘sconny have FIBs hanging around?
jdm
any town in northern WI that has an airport will have an infestation of FIBs – Siren gets its share.
nerd;
Don’t tell me. Let me guess. They have theirs, now they don’t want anyone else there, right?
Sounds like the former CEO of an IT Services company that I worked for in the 1990s. He bought a home in the high hills around Sedona, AZ. He bought the other six lots around him to prevent crowding. But, after all, he was from Chicago.
Markie Suckerberg did the same thing. He bought out all of the homes around his mansion to protect his privacy, which is pretty ironic since he doesn’t care about anyone else’s.
More like, we like it the way it’s been for 50 years, so don’t change it. It’s not a suburb, so don’t let it become one and drive out the old residents. You can still move here, just don’t expect to change it once you do. Had a couple of developers subdivide some spots into what locals viewed as developments and folks didn’t want that to continue and change the nature of the township.
jdm – They probably do, but all those woods are ideal for snipe hunting.
I was going add earlier that wherever you (decide to) land, make sure you(r neighbors) have lots of, umm, hardware available. It might be where you have to make a stand. The novel Indian Country sketches this out well.
Mine don’t much talk about it, nor do I. Just that we have some hardware. Heck, my wife doesn’t know how much hardware I have. But with all the stuff going on, she’s getting much more interested in doing some tinkering of her own. (Wife: “You should get a [small number screwdriver] to teach the youngest to [tinker].” Me: “ANOTHER one? Sure!” Wife: “Wait! You already have one?” Me: “Well, ummm, no, not ONE……”)
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nerd, wait till you need to bring home another safe!
jpa, you mean I shouldn’t have let the wife go east to visit relatives while I stayed home? Who knows what debauchery I could get up to while she was gone?
The good news is that she wanted some tool storage in the bedroom when Mpls went down. Definitely opened up some room in my office closet.