Country Mouse

I have no love for the prairie.

I came to that conclusion yesterday as we drove through central Wisconsin, away from said prairie.

Don't get me wrong. Madison's a nice enough city, and Stoughton's a nice enough town. But they sit on the prairies of southern Wisconsin, which for the most part strike me as boring, rarely-interrupted expanses of grassland. Indeed, the geography of this part of the state was once covered with prairie, oak savannahs, and the occasional marsh -- vastly different from the rolling hills, mature woods, and thick swamps of what I consider home.

So when we drove away from all that yesterday, driving towards Baraboo and the Baraboo River, and the hills it flows between, it somehow felt more like Wisconsin. The weather was nice; it was a warm but not hot day with clear skies and plenty of sunshine.

It comes to no surprise, then, when people remark how Madison seems so different than the rest of the state. It's a nice place to visit, but I don't know that I could live there again. In fact, most of the "suburbs" have much of the same vibe. It seems that it's only once I get far enough away from Madison that I feel really comfortable. I don't know what it is. Maybe Madison really is different from the rest of the state. Or maybe it's that "country mouse in the city" thing that Maryanne keeps talking about.

Mood: Thoughtful
Music: Talking Heads: "Burning Down the House"