Yee-haw

I have never lived on a farm. Never lived near one. Never owned livestock. Closest I think I can claim is horseback riding lessons that I took when I was in elementary school. I think that is an important fact to start with. In fact, I could probably count on one hand the number of friends that I have that grew up in a considerably rural surrounding. I say this now because even though it’s the 8th month of 2011, election season is upon us. Not the 2011 election for planning commissions, local state representation, maybe a school board or two – nope, we are entering the fray of the big dogs. 14 months from now, give or take a week or two, we will go to the polls (HOPEFULLY) and vote for our President.

What this means is that Iowa has now been thrust to the forefront of the political race and with that, the stereo typical representations of what we Iowans stand for. Case in point, this one right here that I saw today on CNN.com

Iowa greets you honestly.As you fly into Des Moines, the state confronts you, flat and blunt, green fields disciplined by straightforward grids. The people are direct, too. Soaring rhetoric and urban glitz not only fail to impress, they seem ridiculously out of place here. Iowans dress to work, not to affect. Rhinestones are reserved for Friday night at the state fair, on women's jeans.

Now, I fully understand that the press works in generalities. They create identities, feed a ravenous public what they want to hear and generally rely more on tweets, cell phone videos and speculation when reporting than actually doing their job. This saddens me at many levels and is a whole other post. So it doesn’t surprise me that this type of editorlization of my state is happening. So queue the footage of cows, tractors and grain silos. I would be willing to bet that this person flew into Des Moines, spent maybe a few hours in town, before heading up to Ames for the Straw Poll and turned around and left. Maybe he checked out the State Fair. And don’t get me wrong, I love the Fair. I do. But my reasons for loving the Fair are its novelty. Not that its representative of the entirety of this state. But without fail, we will be depicted as old school, blunt, bedazzled, overall-wearing, yahoo’s who spend more time speculating on hog futures than if Kim Kardashian will wear Vera Wang or Monique Lhuiller for her wedding dress. Because THAT is important and indicative of a level of sophistication that clearly we are not capable of. Bottom line, it just bugs. I am not saying that I am above or superior to the rural inhabitants of this state. Far from it, the rural life can be tough, demanding and never ending in its demands on your time. But to fixate on it as it’s the only thing going around here grates on my nerves some times. And by some times, I mean roughly every 4 years when the election cycle comes around to caring about us again. Plus, if you look at the actual stats, we are not as rural as some would have you believe. According to our good friends at Wikipedia,

Iowa's population is more urban than rural, with 61 percent living in urban areas in 2000, a trend that began in the early 20th century.[55] Urban counties in Iowa grew 8.5% from 2000 to 2008, while rural counties declined by 4.2%.[65] The shift from rural to urban has caused population increases in more urbanized counties such as Dallas, Johnson, Linn, and Polk, at the expense of more rural counties

So, while this doesn’t bode well for the future of the farmer, the idea of Iowa as this bastion of farm country is a changing one. Obvious to everyone, save the press. I guess what I am saying, is that while you will watch the news over the next months, please be sure to take the depiction of all things Iowa with a grain of salt. Because if nothing else is true, this is… no one, and I mean NO ONE should wear rhinestones – state fair or otherwise, not even Kim Kardashian.

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