I Am a Kansan

I am a Kansan.

I don’t mean that I’m a property value-watching, school district score-analyzing Johnson Countian, although I am. Nor I do mean that I invest an inordinate amount of my emotional well-being on the fate of a certain college basketball team. But I do.

A real Kansan has shoveled manure, baled hay, fed cattle and posted holes. He has dirt under his fingernails and disdains anyone who doesn’t work for a living. She’s distrustful of government, exceedingly reserved, and lives in a town like Claflin, Russell or Zenith.

A true Kansan is humble, austere and avoids gratuitous physical contact. Book learning and new technology are embraced, but ostentatious displays of physical beauty or prosperity are unacceptable.

While I don’t embody all these traits, the generations of Kansan blood running through my veins makes me feel guilty when I stray from my heritage. I won't get above my raising.