Adjusting

When Josh and I decided we were in fact moving to North Dakota we decided we need to stop saying "if we move to North Dakota" and instead say 'when we move to North Dakota".  In the same way I have been making an effort to stop saying "at home..." and instead "in Washington..."  As weird as it is and whether I'm ready or not, this is my home.  We're still not sure if we go visit somewhere else and are asked where we're from how to answer that question.

There are adjustments everyday and there really are times that I think "I can't believe people live here!".  One time recently was when I was walking from my car to the store on a half frozen, bumpy parking lot with the wind blowing side ways and you couldn't tell if it was snowing or the wind was blowing the already feet of snow on the ground.  I wanted to scream out "Seriously you're ok living in this?!"  This may be why a town of 40,000 is the 4th largest in the state.  I have also learned that Minot may have almost all of the same stores as  Washington, but they're all a smaller version.  Let's take Best Buy-Josh wanted to check it out yesterday.  Every Best Buy I've ever been to you walk in and are overwhelmed with all the products and different departments.  The second we walked into Minot's Best Buy you could see the ENTIRE store.  As my friend Michelle would say "Wah wahhhh..."

I do wonder if sometimes the transition is harder because I spent the last few years living in affluent Gig Harbor and not say...Kent or Puyallup.  For instance Walmart- in Gig Harbor Walmart is a cheap, unethical monster.  In North Dakota, Walmart is convenient and a great value (coincidentally "Great Value" is the name of their generic brand.).  It is also normal and acceptable for people to simply put their trash bags on the curb for pick up instead of in the trash can.  In fact when we put our trash can out, they did not take our trash.  We think it's because we didn't take the lid off for them, but we're not entirely sure.

Not everything is "hard" here.  In fact the water is soft (har har).  Seriously it takes longer to wash your hands and hair, but my skin doesn't need as much moisturizing.  Also, Dr. Pepper is EVERYWHERE.  I love Dr. Pepper so this is a good thing.  The only other place I've experienced that has the same love for this drink is Texas and I'm pretty sure that's because it's made in Waco, TX.  Probably the best thing I've experienced here is the nice people!  I'm not sure if it's because Minot still has that old small town feeling (post on that later) or because we're so close to Canada but in the few weeks I've been here I have numerous stories to tell about the great people.  I'll tell you my most recent experience.  This week we had a very angry customer at work. Whatever, strangely being the manager at a place that hosts kid's birthday parties I am used to angry customers.  Later my boss was telling me that in the twenty some years he's worked with the company he's only experienced 4 or 5 people that angry.  I laughed and said that was a weekly occurrence where I was from.  This led to a conversation about the culture of this area.  It is almost foreign to people here to ask for government help (no wonder this is such a red state), mostly because there is no need.  You make a friend here and you're considered family.  He then asked me, "After the flood out of the 14,000 people effected how many do you think went to a shelter set up by the Red Cross?"  I guessed a third. Nope- less than 100 people!  I was speechless.  People took in others, there was just no need.  Hmmm, maybe that's how people live here.