One thing I constantly have to remind myself when I come home is that the Rockies run on a different set of rules from everything else. The pace of life is different, for one. In the winter, the tempo of existence depends completely on the weather, so one makes plans and travels over several days. When the snow started here last night, everything ground to a slow halt, and we sit with friends and drink coffee and "bullshit" each other, as my mother Goose might say. When the roads melt off and all are ploughed, the pace of life will quicken back up to a regular, but still lazy pace. Those differences stand out more and more every Christmas I go back and try to pick up the rhythms again.
For instance, my parents and I headed out to the grocery store, but they stopped by the old A&W to grab a cup of coffee first. A bunch of people that my Papa Fox knows all meet for coffee twice a day-- 9AM and 3 PM-- and they come religiously. We piled out of the car in the parking lot, and my father left the car unlocked and running while we sat. Mama Goose introduced me to one of her friends and her son. The server brought out the coffee pot and filled us all up. My mother pulled out a twenty to pay for the coffee and promptly got the stinkeye.
"I'm ignoring you," the server said to my mother.
"What, my money's not good enough for you?" Mama Goose asked with a grin. The server sniffed at it.
"Stinks," she answered. My mom scoffed and put her money back. So, we all got free coffee as we talked, and that restaurant owner got to show her unusual brand of appreciation to her regular customers and loyal friends. The small business owners don't always focus on the bottom line, it seems; things run different out here.
Also, did you know that not every person in this country has to get searched to get on a passenger plane? Not to mention carriers or locations, but when we brought my grandfather in late at night to board his flight back to Montana, the TSA agent had already been sent home and the only passenger coming in for hours was old Grampa Wolf. The agent for the flight took and scanned his bags, walked him by hand to the gate, and took him through a side door out to the plane, no pat downs or anything. We gave him a hug right in front of the only gate in the airport, and out he went, without ever entering the secure boarding area first.
I'm sure that there's someone out there who'd freak out at the thought of an unsearched person boarding a plane, but around here it makes a lot of sense. They were picking up a single traveler, an 87 year-old man who caught the very last flight out. The plane had no connections to anywhere else and only twelve minutes to get back in the air. There might be two TSA agents in the county, so why keep them there for another three hours to search one person with no carry-on bags? He was in no danger of entering the larger flight system, and once his ID was verified and his bags checked, there was no reason to make an old man with bad balance and Padgett's disease completely undress for a hand search. We just do things different here.
So, why such a nonchalant way of relating to others? I suppose what really makes things different is that there are no strangers...
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