Flatville
I live near Flatville. No, seriously. The weight (in pounds) of the average resident of this slice of red America is obese. I’ve wondered why the townsfolk of near-Flatville don’t exercise. Could it be that there is no point in walking? It’s either miles of corn of miles of “little boxes, ticky tacky little boxes” to borrow an old Pete Seeger line about subdivisions. And a stroll through corn and little boxes is hardly a purpose for strolling at all. Walk to downtown? Ha! Walmart killed that years ago.
When Madeline l’Engle wrote A Wrinkle in Time, she depicted a place where every home looked the same and every person acted identically. She was writing about near-Flatville: “Below them the town was laid out in harsh patterns. The houses all looked exactly alike, small square boxes painted gray. Each had a small rectangular plot of lawn in front, with a straight line of dull-looking flowers edging the path to the door…. In front of all the houses children were playing.” But each child played exactly alike. “As the skipping rope hit the pavement, so did the ball. As the rope curved over the head of the jumping child, the child with the ball caught the ball. Down came the ropes. Down came the balls. Over and over again. Up. Down. All in rhythm. All identical. Like the houses. Like the paths. Like the flowers.” This is where I live.
When I arrived here I was an avid bicyclist. I’m still a bicyclist mind you, but avid? . . . no. You see, at first I thought that I could ride hundreds of miles a day through such perfectly flat lands with endless stretches of paved road and little traffic. But alas, the wind here is impassible except for those brief stretches when it is blowing with you. Why the wind? As my father said when he came out here to bike, "because there is nothing to stop it." It is so flat here that I am certain God forgot it for a day at least. It may have taken him six days to create the world, but only four or five to create near-Flatville. There are no mountains here, no hills, no plateaus, no mounds. There are no seas here, no lakes, no rivers, no streams. There are no trees here, no shrubs, no bushes, no plants (except for the identical flowers). It’s simply Flatville.
When Madeline l’Engle wrote A Wrinkle in Time, she depicted a place where every home looked the same and every person acted identically. She was writing about near-Flatville: “Below them the town was laid out in harsh patterns. The houses all looked exactly alike, small square boxes painted gray. Each had a small rectangular plot of lawn in front, with a straight line of dull-looking flowers edging the path to the door…. In front of all the houses children were playing.” But each child played exactly alike. “As the skipping rope hit the pavement, so did the ball. As the rope curved over the head of the jumping child, the child with the ball caught the ball. Down came the ropes. Down came the balls. Over and over again. Up. Down. All in rhythm. All identical. Like the houses. Like the paths. Like the flowers.” This is where I live.
When I arrived here I was an avid bicyclist. I’m still a bicyclist mind you, but avid? . . . no. You see, at first I thought that I could ride hundreds of miles a day through such perfectly flat lands with endless stretches of paved road and little traffic. But alas, the wind here is impassible except for those brief stretches when it is blowing with you. Why the wind? As my father said when he came out here to bike, "because there is nothing to stop it." It is so flat here that I am certain God forgot it for a day at least. It may have taken him six days to create the world, but only four or five to create near-Flatville. There are no mountains here, no hills, no plateaus, no mounds. There are no seas here, no lakes, no rivers, no streams. There are no trees here, no shrubs, no bushes, no plants (except for the identical flowers). It’s simply Flatville.
posted by Definer at 3:49 AM
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