Audio version of this post:
“You can’t go home again.” - Someone sad
“Yeah, but what if I try?” - This Substack
This week I learned that someone who knows me very well, with whom I was in a committed relationship for almost a decade, had no idea I missed the Midwest.
I’m befuddled as to how I managed not to communicate this to him. “I think everyone’s sad and scared and homesick,” I said, in an effort to explain why I hadn’t let him in on such a central aspect of what it feels like to live in my head.
He told me, to my shock, that he wasn’t. He knows himself well, and I know him well enough to believe him.
Capitalism? Nostalgia? Or maybe it’s smartphones…
It stunned me that not everyone walks around with a lifelong sense of displacement. I thought the vague sense of alienation was a defining feature of late-stage capitalism, combined with the disconnect between the world we evolved for and the one we live in. Why else would there be so many stories about going home? Dorothy and her shoes, ET and his phone, Marty McFly and his DeLorean, Odysseus, for God’s sake, can you really blame me for thinking this wasn’t a big deal?!
Anyway. For me, the root of this longing for home rests on three assumptions:
I have basic traits.
So do locations.
Places exist where (1) and (2) align.
This calls for research
Rather than examining #1 for this newsletter (I have a therapist for that), I’m going to start with two questions. Is there really such a thing as “Midwestern culture?” If so, what is it, and how did it get here?
OK, technically that’s three, but whatever.
In subsequent editions of Constitutionally Midwestern, I’m going to examine some stereotypes about life in flyover country. My personal experience will play a role, but because I know that my belly button is interesting only to me, I’m also going to do research, including interviewing experts, to find out just how much of my nostalgia is based in reality and how much of it is just the u-shaped curve of happiness.
Some of these themes will include:
Midwest humor
I noticed right away, when I visited Bloomington for the first time, how often I found myself laughing. I think this is true in general: Midwesterners are funny.
Improv comedy was born here. This gave rise to SNL, which has arguably defined American comedy for the last 50 years (whether you like it or not). Remember these guys? It doesn’t get any more Midwestern Humor than that.
When I moved to California I took an improv class to make friends, and found that I was good enough at it that I now play professionally.
Is that because I grew up where improv was born, or is this a coincidence?
Is there such a thing as a “Midwestern sense of humor?” If so, where did it come from, and why does it flourish here?
Midwest nice
After 6 years in California, I can attest to the below.
The Midwest feels somewhere in between: conflict-avoidant, keeping the peace at all costs, but actually willing to help you in real, tangible ways at a moment’s notice. (See my first post about a bunch of guys digging out my Prius from the snow when they realized I was definitely Not From Here.)
Is there really such a thing as “Midwestern culture?” If so, what is it, and how did it get here?
Still, last weekend I drove up to Indianapolis with some new friends who grew up here, and from about Martinsville to Mooresville, they bitched about “Midwest nice.” They hated not being allowed to broach difficult topics with family, always having to talk about the weather and sports. Midwest nice seems nice, they said, but at the end of the day, it makes it real hard to connect.
I’ve heard the theory that when you live in a place that wants to kill you several months out of the year, community outweighs individuality. You can’t follow your heart if it stops beating in a snowdrift, or your gut if it’s empty cause your crops all died and you’re such an asshole that none of your neighbors invite you to dinner. Others say it’s a feature of Irish Catholicism: anyone who grew up here knows what John Mulaney meant when he said, “I’ll keep all my emotions right here, and then one day, I’ll die.”
If “Midwest nice” is an observable phenomenon, what are its roots? What are its costs and benefits, and how does it compare to East Coast Kind, West Coast Nice, and Southern Hospitality?
There’s no place like home–no, really, there isn’t
There’s a third aspect to this project that’s harder for me to define, which is why I’m not doing it right away. It’s number three on my list.
Places exist where (1) [me] and (2) [where I live] align. - Me, earlier
I want to find out whether there is such a thing as “belonging.” Here’s what I’m scared of uncovering: there isn’t.
But.
Since moving to Bloomington, I’ve met maybe four of five people who call themselves “Bloomerangs.” People leave and come back so often that it’s an inside joke, a known concept, a Thing. My landlord was gone for a decade and came back. An awesome new friend who’s a huge leftie fellow feminist came back. A guy at my coworking space went to grad school here, moved to New York City and Phoenix and Seattle and all kinds of places, and when I asked why he ended up here he responded:
During the pandemic, I said, “Screw it. I don’t care how uncomfortable it is, I’m really not happy moving from expensive megacity to expensive megacity. I want my own time and my sanity back.”
What the hell is going on here that makes people feel like it’s “home?”
I’m going to start with members of two of the groups I belong to, Orange Theory and the coworking space I came here for, The Mill, because I’ve heard from multiple people, on many occasions, that these two are the best communities in Bloomington. (I’m going to be delighted if I find out that everyone here says the same thing about their tribe.) I’m going to ask what it is about these places that make them feel like home.
As I learn more, I’ll widen my circle into more communities and find more folks who know how to build belonging, to ask for their expert opinions. Why, and how, does social cohesion happen? Is it deliberate, is it conscious? Or does it have something to do with Bloomington itself?
Even if I don’t learn the answers, I get to ask people questions about what makes them feel seen, where they go to feel safe and secure. And who, in a world where the constant influx of news makes everything feel hopeless and futile and fucked, couldn’t stand to hear more about that?
So let’s do this
Maybe you, like me, live with homesickness so ubiquitous you don’t even think it’s worth mentioning, even to the people you love the most.
I’ll keep all my emotions right here, and then one day, I’ll die.
Or maybe the sense of unrest is what drives us to create, to strive, to keep looking for a way to be seen, and it’s only toxic when it’s exploited to feed the engine of the runaway train of endless “economic growth.”
Maybe the pandemic has brought us to a moment where we’re collectively done with grind culture. Maybe we’re all ready, figuratively speaking, to come home.
If you have any aspects of Midwestern culture you’d like me to cover, please don’t hesitate to reach out–especially if they involve Very Serious Investigative Trips to places like this.
First up: Midwest humor!