An Open Apology to Minnesota

As soon as I was old enough to be insolent, I wanted to move to the city. My small Minnesotan hometown always felt stifling, despite being surrounded by vast farmland dotted with countless lakes. Sure, I could go for a swim whenever I wanted, but who was going to force me to read Chaucer? Where was I going to protest for women’s rights?

College bound and swaddled in naïveté, I traded parental supervision for a 450-square-foot apartment in Minneapolis. I was happy(ish). I loved the University of Minnesota and I hated mathematics. I turned 21 and discovered alcohol tasted exactly the same as it did when I started drinking it four years prior. I had relationships and I ended them. Nothing around me ever seemed to change, and I grew to detest the places and people that I loved.

After seven years in Minneapolis, I grabbed my knapsack and set out for the Windy City, hoping the late nights and loud trains could satiate my desire for unpredictability. I got a job at a marketing firm and wore business-y dresses. I exercised relentlessly in an attempt silence my stifled creativity. I was unhappy(ish). No matter what I did, I kept getting that “I’m perpetually dissatisfied and I don’t know why but I’m sick of getting parking tickets and being harassed by men on the street,” feeling. So I started traveling.

I’m happy.

Visiting my parents has always been something I’ve enjoyed. In my younger years, escaping the squalor of my own life and enjoying a fridge filled with free food was actually form of therapy. And yet, it always felt…lacking. Everything looked exactly the same, and nobody seemed to mind.

But this visit, something changed.

After four months outside of the United States, soaking up other cultures, landscapes and cuisine, I returned home to the unfamiliar. And don’t misunderstand me – it’s not that after a brief stint away I’m returning “cultured” and “Omg the United States looks so different because I just lived in Spain and you guys don’t have tapas wtf!” It’s simply that after becoming accustomed to viewing places with an open mind and virgin eyes, I suddenly realized that I may have been too hard on Minnesota.

Somewhere along the way, I forgot that Minnesota was special. The cool, mossy bark of long-fallen trees under a canopy of fluttering oak, or the smell of your skin after you’ve spent an afternoon on the lake. Was I really too busy to notice? Fireflies, campfires, the bounty of my mom’s garden or the tiny feet of a dragonfly – everything that seemed normal I dismissed as boring. I forgot that the songbirds are deafening and the wood ticks are numerous. I forgot how brisk and earthy the air smells in the morning.

I’m guilty of severe under-appreciation.

It might seem normal to float down a river with a case of beer and your best friends, but to most people, it isn’t. Our ability to bike, run, kayak, canoe, hunt, fish, swim, wakeboard, ski, snowboard and sled at various points throughout the year is remarkable. Sure, it’s cold and seasonal affective disorder is a bitch, but there’s beauty in it, too.

I’m sorry, Minnesota, for neglecting you. You’ve been remarkable this whole time – I just couldn’t be bothered to notice.

Want more Madison? Send her a message to talk shop about marketing, mobility and beyond.