Against the Wind
Last summer I went back to the first place I ever left. My family moved from Laramie to Cheyenne, Wyoming when I was 6, and then two years later we lived in Laramie again for a short while before moving to Texas. We drove away, 21 hours in a car without air conditioning in August, and my baby sister cried every minute of it. At the beginning of third grade, I stood in front of the class in Dallas and introduced myself to the other children sitting at desks in neat and well-spaced rows. I told the class I was from Wyoming, and the teacher, lit cigarette in hand (honest, it was the 80s), drawled "Mi-ami?! How excitin!" No, I said. Wyoming. The state. And she looked at me blankly. So I showed her, on the map pulled down in front of the blackboard behind her--this is Miami. In Florida. And way over here is Wyoming. There are mountains but also the prairie. And she sent me to the hall for being rude. I didn't mean to be rude, I just didn't know what to do wit