Lately I’ve had the misfortune to be around a lot of big city people, which served as a good reminder as to why I like country folks so much.

City people dine on cuisine while country folk eat steak and beans. Urbanites have dinner parties where they munch on micro greens and finger food. Rural people have potlucks and eat with silverware, occasionally plastic. They have been known to dip their cornbread in milk. City slickers expound on steak tartar and gazpacho while country dwellers prefer their soup and steak to be cooked. Or at least heated.

Residents of the big city think they are fighting terrorism with color coded warnings and airport shoe removal. Rural residents think of homeland security more in terms of a 12-gauge and a healthy dose of skepticism about strangers. A stranger being anyone whose family hasn’t lived nearby for at least three generations. The most important people in the lives of urbanites are their therapists, interior decorators, personal trainers and investment advisors. In the country family comes first followed by the veterinarian and the banker. City folks go to Bangkok and Europe for vacation and bring back digitized pictures and fears of bird flu. Rural residents go to Disney World and the Grand Canyon and bring back memories and cheap souvenirs.

City folks read the New York Times and listen to Howard Stearn. Country people read farm papers and listen to Paul Harvey and Baxter Black. Big city sports fans root for NBA and NFL stars who disrespect them. Those who live out beyond the city limits signs go to high school games and root for kids they probably spanked once or twice. Residents of metropolitan areas have to have a critic tell them if a movie or a book is any good whereas country people can still make up their own mind.

If someone who lives in a large city gets shot, it’s probably by a member of one of many gangs that haunt their streets. If a rural resident gets shot, it was because someone at a branding missed with the vaccine gun.

The teaming masses in our cities have to be entertained at all times. They go to the theater or the opera and they listen to rappers on their i-pods while they sip Frappuccinos at Starbucks. Those who live in the country prefer peace and quiet. To them there is nothing prettier than the sound of a cricket or a calf calling to its mother. City folks are classified into neighborhoods by their breeding. If rural residents give a whit at all about breeding it’s because the new bull is shooting blanks.

The only contact urbanites have with animals is on Animal Planet. They want to save the grizzly and the wolf. In the country animals are everywhere and residents there are more concerned with saving their kids from the grizzly and the wolf. Urbanites don’t believe in private property rights because they don’t own much. By giving each year to the Nature Conservancy and Sierra Club, they think they are saving the earth and the ozone. Country folks think such people are high on ozone.

City folks wave to people in other cars with their middle finger and talk about stress, hot stocks and themselves. Mostly what they do is consume stuff. Countrified residents offer a friendly wave and talk about rainfall totals, grass conditions and the livestock market. If they brag at all it’s about their kids or a good horse they are riding. What they do mostly is produce the stuff the city dwellers make a living selling, trading and consuming. Urbanites workout at gyms; rural workers workout at work.

Inhabitants of urbane municipalities take great pride in keeping up with all the fads and trends and are always dressed in the latest styles. Ruralites know how to dress too... mostly deer, lambs, rabbits, chickens and such. They are survivalists who know how to hunt, fish and grow a garden whereas most city dwellers wouldn’t last longer than the expiration date on their soy milk after their granola bars ran out.

This farm news was published in the February 8, 2006 issue of Farm World.