by Rick Douglas
MARSHFIELD, Wisc. - The corn is as high as, well, you know. And there are cows, lots of cows. Welcome to Wisconsin, America's Dairyland. Pam and Frank Turner arrived here just in the past few days and it's been something of a revelation.
The Eugene couple has been battling heat and high mountain passes far more frequently than they expected as they bike from Oregon to Maine. It's both a fund-raising exercise and a chance to bond as soulmates.
Pam is raising money for "Courageous Kids," a non-profit associated with Sacred Heart Medical Center that offers grief counseling to children between 6 and 18 who have lost a parent. It's been one of her talking points on the back roads they have traveled--along with corn prices, the evils of windmills and the weather. Always the weather.
Two nights ago, Pam says they could see they were about to head into a bad storm. There were thunderheads forming in the distance, two huge ones racing toward each other like large frigates on the open sea.
"We arrived in a little town called Plum City," she says. "It was so small, it had no motel and no campgrounds. So we pitched a tent against the back of a building." And then they prayed. Fortunately, it all worked out.
Pam says they were happy to leave Minneapolis and its environs because there are virtually no towns large enough in the area to offer even small motels. Now that they're well into Wisconsin, that's no longer a problem.
What Pam enjoys most is how friendly people have been. "Ninety-nine-point-nine percent are spectacular." Makes you wonder about the other .1%.
She says people in the Heartland make time to talk, even to total strangers. They want to hear about the couple's trip and, a bit strangely, what the rest of America is like. Americans might be Americans, but apparently folks in Wyoming are nothing like those who build monuments to cheese curds or a talking cow named "Chatty Belle."
If we are indeed a melting pot, then it's clear we're a fondue, one that mixes cheddar, Monterey Jack, jalapeno, Swiss, Velveeta and something unidentifiable you spray from a can.
