Nebraksa: #1 Great Getaway Destination

I’m a Colorado girl, born and raised in Pueblo, in sight of the Rockies’ purple-mountain majesty. I had never lived on the Plains before my parents drove me out to Nowheresville, Nebraska, and dumped me at college.
I spent my first few months in the Heartland looking for mountains on the skyline so I could figure out which way was West, and trying to determine what “pellows” (pillows) an “crains” (crayons) are.
During my first few weeks in Nebraska, a native in my dorm asked me, “Have you ate yet?”
Confused, I responded, “Have I eight what?”
I finally adjusted my internal compass so it always points to the nearest Wal-mart, and discovered that all through streets in Nebraska are numbered (where 1st equals Main Street) and all cross streets are lettered from A to Z. When they run out of letters, they start over with numbers again—which means you could actually become that unfortunate weirdo who lives at the corner of 4th and 4th.
We don’t have numbered streets in my hometown, and the streets don’t run in carefully ordered blocks like graph paper. We have hills in Pueblo (the unfortunate side-effect of mountains), and our road map resembles a pile of yarn strewn about by a bunch of hyper cats. Our streets are named after famous golf players, exotic Mexican phrases like Avenida del Oro and Calle de Caballos, and plants you will never see in Colorado— ever: Fern, Ivy, Rosewood. These plants tend to shrivel at the mere mention of “rain shadow,” which you will find in the dictionary under “Pueblo, CO.”
When I arrived in Nebraska, I was shocked to see people’s front yards are carpets of lush, dark green verdure. We don’t have lawns in southern Colorado. We have rocks, cacti, and yucca plants. Certain residents of Nebraska attempt to grow varieties of yucca and Agave in their front yard. I see the fat, flaccid fronds, bloated and drooping from constant exposure to moisture, and shake my head.
With water, unfortunately, comes insects. When I first came to Nebraska, I took a walk in the park in early September. The air throbbed with a strange, pulsing bass hum I had never heard before. I was trying to decide whether the noise was a machine or the strains of some kind of New Age hypnosis music, when something thumped against my leg. I looked down to find what appeared to be a cross between a grasshopper and a German Panzer staring up at me with big, googly eyes.
Don’t get me wrong; I like bugs usually. When I escape my exile, I’m plotting ways to smuggle preying mantises and fireflies back to Colorado. But I swear cicadas are not insects. They are some kind of Jurassic-alien hybrid evolving into sentient lifeforms. I think they’re trying to communicate. They all pulsate in rhythm like some kind of hive-mind heartbeat. They’re either plotting to take over the world or summoning the mothership. I wonder if anyone has ever tried to interpret cicada thrumming with Morse Code. They’re probably telling us We Shall Be Assimilated.
I still find myself looking longingly for mountains on the skyline. But in the meantime, the Maple in my backyard is on fire with crimson and russet. In the spring, every tree in town will burst into pink, white, and purple fire. Before the cicadas hatch, and begin their annual concerto to brainwash the world. You will fall first, heathens!