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a September 27th, 2011

  1. What Would You Change About North Dakota?

    September 27, 2011 by Becoming Midwestern

    I was browsing the Inforum today and one particular headline popped out to me. “What Would You Change About North Dakota?”

    My mind began racing, my heart began pounding, and as I clicked on the link, I realized it was time to blog.

    Basically, a reporter is asking residents to finish this sentence: “If I could change anything about North Dakota, I would _____ .” Readers can e-mail their responses and a story may be written about it in an upcoming issue of the newspaper.

    Not surprisingly, I have mixed emotions about this. I am not going to lie and pretend that North Dakota is my own personal Eden, but I have tried for the past few months to highlight the many positives about this region of the country. It is a little depressing to me that folks will be pointing out all the negatives about the state that I have been defending. In respect to the art of journalism however, I guess I can jump on the band wagon.

    If I could change anything about North Dakota, I would:

    1. Make temperatures not fall below 32 degrees. (Typical answer for most I assume.)
    2. Make tickets out of the Fargo airport cheaper so I wouldn’t have to fly out of Minneapolis all the time.
    3. Have avocados fresh and ripe all year round.
    4. Ask gigantic trucks to slow down during the first major snow storm.
    5. Bring in a little more diversity to the state.

     

    Now, hopefully the last one doesn’t ruffle too many feathers, but I challenge anyone to deny that North Dakota is not very ethnically diverse compared to other parts of the country. And for me, I am able to learn more about myself by coming in contact with those that are from different backgrounds.

     

    All in all, I think that everyone can find negatives anywhere they live, but what’s the point? Maybe I’m a naive optimist, but isn’t it better to focus on the positives of North Dakota in the media this past year instead of the negatives?

     

    I guess the truth is, I can tolerate practically everything in North Dakota if I could just find a good avocado in January.

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