My Problem with Being a Hoosier

I am an Illinois native, born and bred.  I've lived all over the world with my father's tenure in the Navy, but we always came back to Illinois.  That's where the family farm was, the roots, the love.  It was home.

When in college, I noticed that other students talked "funny".  If they lived south of Springfield, IL, or east of Champaign, they had a twang.  South of Springfield became the Kentucky influence, and east of Champaign was the Indiana influence.  I tended to look down on that because I was (and still am, to some degree) a language snob.  What I didn't know then is that there is a pecking order in state societies:  Illinoisans looks down on Hoosiers; Hoosiers pick on Kentuckians; Kentuckians make fun of Tennessee folk...and so it goes, ad infinitum 

Then I  married a Hoosier in 1977.  We both lived and worked in Illinois--he, a graduate of Fillmore High School and Indiana State University, and me, a graduate of a Chicago suburban school and Illinois State University.  His family lived near Greencastle, IN.  That was my first introduction to Indiana--going to visit his folks.  In 1988, when he lost his principalship in the town where we lived, we launched a huge search for a position in a desirable location.  Then a position in a school district just 10 miles south of his parents in Indiana showed up.  There were complications, but we worked hard that summer to make it work.  In the hot summer of 1988, we moved to Cloverdale, IN.

We hadn't been in Indiana two years before my husband's eye wandered to his secretary in Cloverdale.  He left the marriage, leaving me no choice but to divorce him.  Secretly, I think my father was hoping that I would move back to him on the farm in Streator, IL.  He thought I could stay there rent-free, help take care of him, get a local teaching job, and all would be well.  I didn't see it that way.  Living on the farm wasn't something that Megan could have survived in a healthy way.  And my job was in Indiana, with no promise of any positions anywhere near my dad's. 

Megan and I moved to Plainfield, IN, where I still live.  At first, she and I rented an apartment in what people in Indiana call a "double".  (Other places call it a duplex.)  I was newly employed as a teacher in the Monroe-Gregg School District, still having to take college classes to get my teaching certificate up to snuff after our move to IN.  My ex had the house in Cloverdale.  I decided that our daughter should not have to live in a rental place when her father and his paramour had a 2,000 square foot home just 31 miles away.  I decided to look for a home to buy, just for us.

My landlady for the duplex was a real estate agent.  I talked to her about helping me, and if I could break my lease if she found something for us.  She was totally agreeable.  In short order, we looked at two places and settled on a small, affordable house-on-a-slab.  All I needed was a downpayment.  I went to my father who agreed to give me the funds, but in his disappointment that I wouldn't be returning to Illinois, he spat out, "I suppose this means you're going to be a HOOSIER!" It stung.  I actually bought the house with him in mind:  all on one level.  No stairs.  If I needed to bring him here to live, I was ready...but it was not to be.  Meg and I moved into the house in March of 1992.  He never saw my home before he died in 1994.  And I became a Hoosier.

With all of that as background, I have to confess that I knew nothing of Indiana politics.  Illinois is notoriously Democrat, with Mayor Daley's "machine" in Chicago leading the charge.  It was corrupt politics, but it was no more corrupt than the Republicans of Indiana who find ways to skirt the law.  I was politically naive.  Politics was never part of my family's conversations, except for my mother saying that FDR was the "Great White Father" to her parents during/after the Depression.  That was all I  needed.  If the Democrats could save the family farm from ruin when the chips were down, I was for it. 

And now I live in a Bible Belt state that is so politically conservative/Republican, with no basis for such in the masses of its residents, I'm shocked.  I'm leaving out a lot about a committee that I was part of in the early 90s in my school district, surreptitiously led by a local Baptist preacher/school board member, where accusations and stupidity abounded.  I am leaving out some stuff about how I received, in the mail, something for a previous homeowner that requested funds for a campaign to run Christians for school boards on suspicious platforms so they could gain control.  To me, this is totally insidious because the American  public doesn't always THINK about things before they act.  The Internet and Facebook show me that, big time.  Religion and patriotism gain votes, no matter the circumstances. 

Indiana legislators are now engaged in the process to amend the state's constitution in order to prevent same-sex marriage.  I read today that they are also engaged in bills to drug test welfare recipients and put limits on food stamps so that only "nutritious" foods can be purchased with them.

Yes!  Gays should NOT be allowed to marry!  They might besmirch the fantastic record of heterosexual marriages.  No one heterosexually married ever cheats on a spouse, abandons children, divorces a spouse? The Bible doesn't define marriage.  Marriage is a civil thing, and nothing in the Bible can be construed as "one man and one woman".  Heck, many Old Testament icons were polygamous.  (Of course, wives were not permitted to have more than one husband)  But Indiana can do better than the Bible.  Obviously, the Bible was flawed!

And yes!  People on welfare should be drug tested and not allowed to purchase certain foods with food stamps!  They are on the public dole.  How dare they presume to purchase potato chips!  They don't deserve anything more than beans and rice!  All they do is take food stamps and welfare money to run amuck!  (Do you detect my sarcasm?)

I am in constant contact with a family that is trying to provide for four kids with both parents disabled.  Let's just make things so difficult for them that they can't survive and see where that gets us in Indiana.  I don't get it.  What "Hoosier values" are we modeling?  The state already bans the sale of alcohol on Sundays, Thanksgiving, and Christmas.  Does that stop alcoholism in the state?  No...but it gives liquor store owners a day off, which is one of the reasons the law hasn't changed.  You also can't buy a car on Sundays in IN because it isn't allowed, by law.  In Indiana, we protect the provider and not the consumer. 

After 26 years as a "Hoosier", I STILL can't accept the politics of this state.  On the whole amendment to the constitution thing, I have written to state congresspeople and even the governor to express my opinion.  I have the feeling that I'm being ignored.  What is "right" doesn't matter in this state.  It's all about what will draw votes.  Religion and patriotism draw votes.  Put a Christian bent on things and you will succeed.  Never mind that Christsianity is NOT about excluding gays or the poor or the disabled as viable citizens. 

Sometimes I am ashamed to say I'm a Christian if "we" can't do better than this.  And sometimes I'm ashamed to say that I'm a Hoosier.