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[thingsareme]

One thing that really weirds me out lately is realizing that 1/2 of my biological "family" is from some place like Montana. I think about it everytime I use a southern accent to mock an opinion I think is backwards or ignorant

Comments

[tyleranosaurus]

My mom originated from Montana, and so did my Dad's parents. I've visisted Montana many times and the people there don't seem super conservative, although I've never really talked to them about politics. They did sort of judge my family as spoiled Californians- even though I was poor relative to my suburban neighbors.

Montana seems much less urbanized than California, and I'm sure this influences the peoples priorities and lifestyle.

[swizzbeats]

They just voted for this guy:

http://www.testerforsenate.com/issues

From what I read about the race when I was thinking about moving there, it seems like he is the cowboy Lamont, beating a bought and paid-for old dinosaur of a warhawk. A hundred years ago, the America's Reds were from the rural south and west, and some of our biggest strikes were in Rocky Mountain mines.

(I'd still go crazy living there, though.)

[thingsareme]

My parents were visiting a few weeks ago, and my dad was telling me how brutal the campaign ads for that race were. Although I think his assumption was (based on nothing) that the warhawk was a shoe-in.

[unclepukis]

This is pretty similar to my situation as well. My Father grew up in Kansas and tells me about killing squirrels and rabbits for his dinner, my Mother grew up on a farm in a town in New Mexico that is still too small to be on any worthwhile map. Other than my Mother and a few of my cousins, no one in my family is college educated and they remain (for the most part) working class. There has always been some degree of culture shock between my immediate family and my extended family because of this, but for the most part I think people are accepting and try to hold thier prejudices (perhaps better than I've learned to hold my own). Reconciling this culture shock has caused me a lot of guilt and shame over the years because I've never felt like my life measured up to the hard work and pain they've had to go through all thier lives. I guess I've never really reconciled this except through realizing that I can't ever have another life and that wishing for more pain is foolish and probably a little bit crazy

[thingsareme]

Agreed. I have heard tons of stories about my Grandfather coming home from working at a smelter with his boots literally filled with blood.

[iamabeard]

yeah, i agree with you louie. and being of the first or second generation which is separated from a line of descendants makes you lose a lot of your culture and sense of place, but as you say there are also positive aspects to it. after i went back to iran and saw all of my decendants i became a lot more aware of my actual background and where my ancestors came from. i recently found out that my grandma can trace her lineage all the way back to Muhammad's family in Arabia, and that lots of my relatives are actually descended from Shahs and dynasties from hundreds of years ago. like i will be reading about some Iranian dynasty from the 18 century and i'll recognize the name and ask my grandma about it and she'll tell me that they were descendants of her brother in-law, for example. i'm trying to learn more about middle eastern history and culture because i feel i have a responsibility to myself to at the very least, understand my family's past, if not, as you mentioned louie, incorporating certain parts of the culture and traditions