Open Notes on Flatlanders
You seem to believe by moving to Vermont, that confers some sort of “Yankee” persona or the highly valued Woodchuck appellation that not even all Vermonters earn.
Far from it, in fact old flatlander habits die a lingering and obvious death.
To wit:
- With the prediction of a minuscule amount of snow, your presence is required at any grocery store. It matters not whether you need anything; you have to go there. It must be genetic.
- You’re surprised to find that 10-year olds have their own shotguns, they are proficient shootists and their mothers taught them how to use them. Why should this be surprising?
- We tell you to save all manner of bacon grease; you’ll find out later on how to use it. You never remember until it’s too late.
- Ayup is from Maine; using it in Vermont is a flatlander giveaway since you don’t have the rest of the accent.
- You’re surprised to find movie rentals and bait sold in the same store. We’re surprised you buy food at this store.
- During mud season, you wouldn’t believe “You can’t hardly get there from here.” So, you had to find out the hard way.
- Finally, you settled in Vermont and had kids, what makes you think they’re Vermonters? When the cat had kittens in the oven, you didn’t call them biscuits.
November 28, 2008 at 7:23 pm | Trackback
44 comments
Reminds me of a story a friend told. 7 generations ago, his family moved to Liberty, New York, and bought the “Smith” house. Now, 7 generations later, the “locals” still refer to the “Smith” house, and not his family’s house. Also, he feels the “locals” still consider him an outsider.
About right. Heehee. Ah, usually be the gran’kids the accent wears off.
You from up around there? Sullivan County, Deposit, Narrowsburgh-Great Grandfather, mothers side founded the town of Narrowsburgh, NY. Know it well.
I’ll not tell the trick about bacon grease, but the woodchucks know why.
Why not? You can cook and flavor with it, insulate with it, waterproof with it, use it as a bug repellent, ointment and lubricant. You can suetize it for birds and polish with it. It has dozens of uses, and saving it doesn’t clog pipes. You might be able to use it as combustible fuel, and even throw handfuls of it at Flatlanders who stop for directions.
It keeps your hair from getting wild, a winter condition known up here as hat head.
Kinda like a Yankee do-rag.
just a ? would Vermonts economy be the same without the flatlanders?
It did fine till they came up and screwed the schools and the taxes.
Their idea of community is, “We need it, lets you and him pay for it.”
Flatlanders love the rural life as long as it’s on a postcard. They want to drive 60 on dirt roads and get that spreader out of MY way.
I don’t see any woodchucks getting their McMansions foreclosed.
Vermont your last post makes no sense . Were would Vermonts economy be with out nj ny ct ma money injected every weekend please explain . ps in ct we do not refer to our good neighbors in slang dirivatives. as in flatlanders we would welcome you as our freinds from the North.
Flatlander, your comment is precisely to the point. How Vermont could exist without your beneficence is beyond all comprehension. What would we do with out CT?
Actually the woodchucks are quite well off, we don’t squander the wealth. Just whom do you think has been selling the land to the flatlanders at high prices and now buying them back at distressed prices?
We don’t need the rudeness. We don’t need the 65 in a 50 MPH zone, passing because you’re in a hurry to get nowhere.
The first thing flatlanders do when they invade is bring that which they’re trying to escape. Oh dear, you mean WE have to take the trash to the dump? We’ll soil our Guccis. Have the town collect it. Kaching up go the taxes.
Their kids can’t walk a mile to school, so the bus stops every 14′ to pick up one of the porkies. Ban soda and snacks because the little blimps can’t fit through the bus door. I see mothers drive the chubbettes from the house to the end of the driveway to get the bus. Kaching taxes for the buses.
One question, Can you type a comment as an adult, using capitals and punctuation as is in current usage in English grammar? Avoid texting symbols, it is more conventional and speaks to a more literate education.
vermonter you seem to a lot of pent up dislike for your neighbors to the south. Ps we love Vermont also
The dislike comes from seeing what your did to your state and seeing what is being done up here. If you’re so worried about the health of our economy, just send the money and stay home. In that way you will vastly improve relations.
You will not be missed.
Woodchuck In Connecticut we would invite you over for dinner and have a vigerous debate over our views and issues that we disagree with then we would break bread together and talk about the enjoyments of life. Woodchuck please dont ever forget were all Americans. May the peace be with you and yours. Maybe the next time you see a blue plate you will stop and just talk to him or her over coffee. Just maybe you and he or she may strike up a conversation and you will agree to disagree and make friends. Heaven forbid a green plate makes friends with a blue plate……..?????????? Some of us also hunt , fish and dont drive minivans
Now, THAT is funny! Flatlander is Mr. Rogers.
Hey, FL. I live a stone’s throw from someone you probably approve of…Dodd.
There’s no more insular, bigoted and discriminating community than the one that’s flourished in these river towns in the past thirty years. I’m not talking about the old-time Townies.
The in-comers…the ones with the “I (heart) VT” bumper stickers.
…and I know them well. I used to restore their junk, their Blue Willow and Green Frankoma, their antiques, and then pray I’d get paid so I could break bread at my own table.
I think we need to introduce sanity checks at the state borders, especially for the “Blue Plate” specials coming up.
The only thing to be broken at his table is wind. He is certifible; if it wasn’t for the ACLU, he’d be wearing the extra long sleeve jacket in canvas twill.
Flatlander has provided an apology for colonialism. Hoards of elite Euros went out to communicate with the savages and introduce them to bourgeois refinements. Now their American versions are going to Vermont and other places.
Rustication and gentrification have been going on for century in the Northeast, and since WWII in the American South, southeast and mountain states. It’s the migration of excess urban wealth, attitudes and people into rural areas, with the supplantation of the rural culture by the urban one.
The transitional pressures, the financial and cultural ones, fall on the natives, because the synthesis always takes s0mething away from them with the promise that urbanity will make up the difference. Denying that this is happening in Vermont is silly, if not just willfully blind to the process.
We see the despoliation of local cultures everywhere it happens, with the great levelling of all things to the mass version. Vermonters, as far as I can tell, didn’t extend an invitatiton to flatlander to sit at the metaphorical table and break the bread of diversity. He arrived on his own, with good vibes as his calling card. All Vermonters are supposed to value that because he does.
In Fairfield county we do! Leaf-peepers are from south of here, stump-jumpers are from north, and apple-knockers are from New York state.
Good ones, Ed. We’ve got a few other dirivatives (sic) here in CT, but they’re no longer acceptable.
“Some of us also hunt , fish and dont drive minivans”
I just saw this last line! Imagine, Fore & aft cap, tweed jacket with patched elbows, flannel trow and 8″ Timberlands and the well cared for Purdy double .28 ga. (very sporting, you know) looking for a brace of partridge or timberdoodles on a Saturday morning.
I hope the next time he comes up he runs into the ass end of a spreader.
Interesting point of view from Woodchuck, I’d say as a fellow VT’er (however currently not living in-state) I’d say I agree with most of your points regarding the influx of Flatlanders. Being from the Northeast Kingdom area we haven’t been as effected as you (I’m assuming you’re more from the Burlington side of the state?) but they still have changed things a bit in the area. Had to laugh at your list although I think “Ayup” isn’t only a Down-easter thing…
Flannels? Moleskins from Barbour.
Lived in Addison Cty as a kid on Lake Dunmore, moved to Plainfield which was as close to the Granola Crescent as I’s ever want to get, then back to Addison Cty. I did live out of state (62 to 85) but, that drove me nuts. Came back just in time to see the invasion. They’re going to run me out yet. This time it’ll be Alaska.
Woodchuck You won be well
I’ve got to admit that it was an amusing exchange, and I had to agree with most of Vermont Woodchuck’s comments.
However, ….
I’m no Woodchuck, and I’m in Addison County because I married one (from Salisbury). But I’m no New England flatlander either. I’m a midwesterner/Appalachian transplant … but I’ve got more in common with Woodchuck than Flatlander.
So just be a little careful about crticizing someone for not being multigeneration Vermonters. You need to know who your friends and allies are!
(Besides, I always say that a midwesterner is just a descendent of a Vermonter who was smart enough to move to good farmland.)
Welcome, in a comment above, I mentioned I grew up in Salisbury and Leicester in the ’40’s and ’50’s. Been around, seen a bit and when asked if I lived in Vermont all my life, the answer is “Not yet!”
Flatlanders are those that move to escape the onerous taxes and restrictive lifestyles, who immediately wish to impose the very things from which they moved to escape.
I’ve been in every state but Alaska and with the exception of the North East/West Coast liberals, found people easy going with a live and let live attitude.
The exceptions are not accepting people.
Rural counsel, you will hear Vermonters make disparaging sounds about woodchucks, usually from those that live in towns and cities.
Woodchucks are the loggers, tappers, junkers, fixers and when the merde hits the ventilateur, they’re left standing.
Appalachian transplants come from fairly gritty stock which makes you a transplant, not a flatlander. That is a distinction WITH a difference.
I’d bet Scot or German stock or a mix, like me.
Yeah - I think that makes sense, went to school over in that area at St. Mikes and while I love Burlington, it’s not what I consider to be Vermont. Rural Counsel is right, I think there are plenty who have moved to the state for the right reasons, but I know there are plenty who move up to the sticks and then try to turn it into “New” Boston. Not what that states supposed to look like. I miss it though, every time I go home to visit the folks a bigger part of me realizes that living in that area is what fits me best. Hopefully it’ll still be as I remember by the time I make it back…
I just can’t help but laugh. According to Wikipedia, Vermont’s highest point is around 4400 feet. I live on the southern end of the Rocky Mountains, in a valley, at 5100 feet.
Methinks the Vermonter’s doth protest too much about the “Flatlanders.”
In fact, all you New Englander’s would be considered “Flatlanders” out here!! Actually, I would say, all you Easterners would be considered “Flatlanders”!
;^)
Oh, and I drive into work every day, staring at a peak that is over 10,500 feet. Any Vermonters up for altitude sickness?
Okay, I am talking tongue-in-cheek. I like the blog, I like the conversations about old versus new culture in a region. Good stuff! But I couldn’t help pointing out how East coast-centric y’all were being…
Size matters.
VT’er in Mass, I’ll bet you noticed the new blight on trees up here that is spreading rapidly. It’s called “Posted, No Hunting or Fishing” or “No Trespassing” and since the early ’90’s is covering the lands.
When it comes to their land, the mantra is “It’s mine!” When it comes to you using your land, say putting in a pond, not a chance. They’ll tell you how and what, just make sure you pay your taxes.
BubbaB, it ain’t the altitude, it’s the attitude that makes one a Flatlander or Woodchuck.
So, what do I got to do to be an honorary Woodchuck?
;^)
Where I’m at (New Mexico), we grumble about the Texans (who drive like idiots on their way to the ski areas) and Californians (who keep moving in and driving up property values.) The defining characteristic of a New Mexican is, well, I’ll tell you later.
(New Mexico is the Land of Manana, which is Spanish for “Tomorrow”.)
We eat green chile, and texas chili is beans and meat, and it ain’t spelled chile. Chile is green or red. (Which is the official state question.) My children have been eating food with chile in it since they were about two, and the oldest (at seven) has no problems eating stuff hot enough to fry our eastern relatives’ delicate palates.
One of our territorial governors, Lew Wallace (wrote “Ben Hur”) said that, “Every calculation based on experience elsewhere fails in New Mexico. ”
The state nickname is, “The Land of Enchantment”. If you move here, you will find enchantment everywhere, mostly on the floors, on the rugs, on the furniture, on the dishes, on the knick-knacks, on the shelves, on the children, on the animals… Every time there is a big storm, we get lots of Enchantment everywhere!!
Never heard of such a thing, I guess you go to Burlington, walk up Church Street (Malled St) and ask some souvenir shop owner for the Honorary Woodchuck Certificate.
JOAT, now that would be akin to a woodchuck.
JOAT=Jack of all Trades. A survivor which is what a woodchuck is.
No flatlander is ever a woodchuck. Not all Vermonters are woodchucks. In fact, many Vermonters consider woodchucks to be hillwilliams of the first order.
joated is right; it’s ATTITUDE! ONE HAS TO HAVE THE ATTITUDE.
Woodchuck Just one more thing why do the call Vermont the land of entitelment
This all started in the sixties when the Jackasses took over. The pinko lefty ideas of it’s better to receive than to do for yourself became the state motto.
Now Vermont is no longer the Green Mountain St. but the “Mountain of Entitlements” State. Except for the people who work or own land. They’re entitled to pay for all this wonderfulness.
Feel better. Flatlanders did it.
Yeah, I went to a selectboard meeting in Shoreham about a month ago … they want to kick the minimum lot size from 2 acres to 15 acres. Oh, and they wanted to ban sawmills. All of this on agriculturally zoned land! Go figure.
The drawbridge liberals (you know, the ones that moved here and now want to pull up the drawbridge so that no one else can do what they did) are all for it. They see it as just another opportunity to tell farmers what they’re allowed to do with their own land.
The smart farmers are the ones who are selling off development rights or conservation easements … because they know that it’s just a matter of time before their land is confiscated or made worthless. Cash out know while they can still get something for it.
The principled farmers who want to control their own property are just mad as hell. And badly outnumbered.
I was beginning to hope that the high price of oil would make local food production a necessity, and then the farmers could let the Birkenstock liberals starve. No such luck.
BTW, I’ll point out one big difference I see between Vermont and Appalachia, and it’s posting private land against hunting. Vermont has this socialist tradition that you could hunt on any unposted land without asking the landowners permission. That always rubbed me the wrong way … seems like asking permission of the land owner would be more respectful of private property rights. And I’ll confess, I post mine. Not because I’m anti-hunting; I just want to know who’s traipsing around my fields and woods with a rifle … I got kids and livestock to worry about, and don’t need some trigger-happy strangers out there without at least knowing about it. Neighbors who know me know all they have to do is ask.
There is another set of signs that can be put up. They read hunting/fishing with permission only. A friend of mine that has 400 acres butting against the Bristol Cliffs Wildlife Area uses them. Works well. I understand your thoughts though, for the property is yours.
The open land idea goes back farther than the socialist explosion occurring from the ’70’s on. There just weren’t many people up here. Maybe 1/4M total pop. The last two towns to get electricity in Vermont didn’t get it until 1964, Victory and Granby.
Down here along the Lower Connecticut, it’s easy to discern the power structure.
A) The descendants of those who didn’t leave after WWII to work in the shops to the north, and therefore inherited everything.
B) The firehouse crowd
C) The sports nuts
D) The teachers
woodchuck hope you were warm today spent all day cutting trees and grooming trails no woodchucks to be seen like they say if the flatlanders build it they will come maybe some woodchucks to…… happy snowmobiling hope it brings the money to vermont
Are you nuts? This Woodchuck was inside clipping coupons on bonds before the end of the quarter. Just what in hell do you think we do up here?
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