August 18, 2015, marks eight years living in North Dakota. So what is life really like in rural North Dakota?
In the summer, when the thermometer can peak at temperatures of 105 degrees, life couldn’t be better. Well, it could be cooler. In the winter when the wind chill drops as low as -50 degrees you wonder how the pioneers survived.
With the closest neighbor 5 miles down the road and the closest town with a Walmart about 30 miles down the road life can be isolating in rural North Dakota. But for the people who live in the middle of nowhere it can be a sort of paradise.
We pulled in the driveway the morning of August 18. We had nothing but warm, summer clothes packed. Instead it was pouring rain and in the low 50’s. Did we just move to the rainiest place on the planet? We ended up going to K-Mart to get sweats.
After what we now affectionately call Monsoon Season, the Sun was always out. Day after day all we saw was a clear blue sky and the Sun. Occasionally, you might see a puff of white passing through, but that was rare.
The thing about life in rural North Dakota that makes life so perfect is life out here is simple.
At first, I don’t think any of us really wanted to be there. In time (read: eight years) we have grown to love it. Especially the summers, that end up being too short in the grand scheme of things. But being short is what makes them so special and something to be enjoyed.
One of the things that came as a major shock to us was the power going out. Sure, we’ve had the power go out on us in the past, but it was during a storm or because someone drove into a pole. It never happened just ’cause on a cloudless sunny day. We’ve come to learn that it’s just the North Dakota way. It’s a little quirk of life up here on the northern prairie.
You are never far from a field full of cows as they outnumber people ten to one.
You are also never far from abandoned buildings. Just don’t go in them, because they’re probably haunted… true story.
Flooding is a major problem here as the whole area used to be a lake. It was filled with the melt-water from the last ice age and named Lake Agassiz (pronounced A-ga-sie). So when the road is flooded for the whole summer because they don’t want to raise it again you just drive right through.
All in all, Middleville, Michigan is still my hometown. But North Dakota is my home and I am proud to call myself a North Dakotan.
If you want to know more about North Dakota, definitely check out the North Dakota Bois video. It’s pretty much all true.
