Friday, July 04, 2008
 | A Far Green Country In which I saw an antelope. On the way to Bismarck yesterday, we saw some kind of varmint off in the distance. It was an antelope. I had never seen one before. Like the friendly badger, the industrious beaver, and the suicidal pheasant, the antelope is common here in North Dakota. There are lots of other walking, creeping, and flying things that man hasn't yet exterminated. I can't imagine what it must have been like here a hundred years ago. Probably the same way it was in Oklahoma, before the state got hooked on meth and whatnot. North Dakota is a clean, beautiful state. It was settled primarily by Germans and Scandinavians. The settlers came here looking for a better life, and they did it the old fashioned way: legally. They learned the language and culture of a new land, but they also preserved their own distinct cultural identity. Garrison Keillor noted these people came from Scandinavia, seeking to escape the harsh and bitter winters, and the poor and rocky soil. They settled in a place in the New World that almost perfectly replicated the land from which they fled. They did not watch much television. The vast majority became farmers. They planted whatever they thought they could sell, and they hoped that Providence would bless them with rain and sunshine in proper quantities. Providence often blessed them with neither. Many prospered, though, and they bought up acres and acres of land. It isn't uncommon, even today, for families to own thousands of acres. Good for them. Good for me if I find some rich old widder woman to marry me. Even better for them today, is the prospect of untold riches in oil revenues. Geologists and oil companies have known for a long time there was oil in this region. The only problem was that good old Providence stored the oil in formations that made it difficult to reach and harvest. Thanks to oil industry pioneers and innovators like J.R. Ewing, technology has made it possible and profitable to get to that oil. Whereas the damn arabs can get to their inferior, albeit plentiful oil with a scimitar, we Americans have to work for ours. Never mind WE taught the ingrates how to get it and refine it. I suppose American capitalists also taught them to employ price gouging – in direct violation of the sacred teachings of the koran, as made up by mohammed. I'd have to ask noted muslim scholar, Barack Obama, about the koran. But I digress. I don't know much about the oil in North Dakota, other than what I read at the world's information source, Wikipedia. Estimates of reserves here in the Bakken Field range from 4-5 billion barrels to 200-400 billion barrels. How I hope the latter estimate is closer to the truth. If we can get to it, and there is that much down there, we can do what I've been dreaming of since the first "energy crisis" in 1973: tell the arabs and their wretched ilk to suck it. You know I mean that in a nice way. We'll return to those halcyon days of driving aircraft carriers, and paying twenty nine cents a gallon for gasoline. Here's hoping that the wonderful families who built and preserved this terrific state, who farmed during times of challenge and adversity, who endured what I am told are Stalingrad-like winters, and who had the smarts to buy up all the land they could… Wonderful, industrious Aryan folk settled, built, and live in this clean state. They are friendly, thoughtful and helpful. They conduct themselves as Americans used to conduct themselves, as if all of us had COMMON SENSE. I've observed they mostly act as if their neighbors, or anyone else they encounter, will do the next right thing, rather than the next dumb or inexplicable thing. People don't bother to lock their cars. People don't worry someone is going to come along and steal their stuff. Why should they? No one would. They'd give it to you if you needed it. Unlike Oklahoma City, one man didn't buy up all the McDonald's restaurants and then employ only – ONLY – people who cannot and will not speak English. Those of you who live in Oklahoma City know exactly what I am talking about. In this wonderful state, one does not encounter people who cannot or will not speak English. Other than a few Canadians, but that is okay. Traffic is a good example of the great life here. There is no traffic to speak of. Yesterday, I had the interesting fortune to end up behind an elderly gentleman in a pickup truck. I'll bet he was a World War I veteran. He looked like a typical, though aged farmer. I did not realize a vehicle could actually be driven THAT SLOWLY without being stopped. The speed of his (and my) vehicle would not register on the speedometer. It didn't bother me, because I was in a good mood, and I, like everyone else up here, was in no particular hurry to get anywhere. So I followed this old man, who wasn't about to cause an accident. People could push a stalled car faster than we were going, believe me. We turned a corner, our little procession, and I spied a young man, likely a high school student, in another car. He noticed how slowly this man (and the rest of us) was driving. It was amusing. He smiled at me. I read a lot in his expression, "isn't it funny how slowly that guy is driving, and ain't it cool this old guy is still around, and that he is still brave enough to drive to the store? Let's all give him a break, because life up here is slower and better." And cleaner. With antelopes. And oil. We were going slowly enough for me to read quite a bit from a smile. In some places, such a young man would have yelled some unnecessary obscenity, or honked, or flipped off the old guy, or done something rude or stupid that didn't help matters one bit. Or shot him. But in Beulah, North Dakota, atop 200 billion barrels of oil, a young guy summed up the potentially annoying situation with a smile. Still, we desperately need a Starbuck's. And they need to learn how to make a decent glass of iced tea. Then we'd have Valhalla, and I'd make a good Valkyrie. I'm jus' sayin'. "And of the Independence of the United States of America, the two hundred and thirty second." Don't be so hard on France. I've said it before, and I'll say it again. If it hadn't been for French aid during the Revolutionary War, we'd all be speaking English today, instead of Spanish. "We have it within our power to being the world over again. Don't muck it up." --Thomas Paine and RPH. RPH, Esq., N.V. |
contemplative 
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