I was Country, when Country wasn’t cool….

I’m from Saskatchewan.  I’m ridiculously proud of that fact.  Because I’m from Saskatchewan I can sing the words to Crystal Chandelier by Charlie Pride without even thinking about it.  Because I’m from Saskatchewan I know that before Reba was just plain Reba she was Reba Mcentire and she sang Country & Western music and was married to Charlie Battles and I have the concert program to prove it.   I can play Kaiser and throw a curling rock.  I can cross country ski and drive three in a tree.  What you see on the outside is a dread lock wearing black chick but what you don’t see is that I can two-step and probably drink you under the table all because I’m from that flat place between Alberta and Manitoba.  I think the province of Saskatchewan is one of the most amazing places on the planet.  And that is saying a LOT because I’ve been to a far many places on this planet.  The people from Saskatchewan are the friendliest on the planet bar none.  And if you want to know where wit, sarcasm and charm were invented, spend some time talking to an old dude at a Legion there.  Seriously.  I can not count on one hand the people I know from home that I could call right this second and say “I need help” that would be at my door.  Not just good friends but acquaintances from school.  Or their brothers or cousins.  It’s “well my cousin Ray is out by there, let me call him and he’ll bring the truck out and get you out of the ditch”.  That is how we roll.  And I can prove it….wear a Rider jersey ANYWHERE on this planet.  It’s our international sign of “come up and talk to me, I’ll be cool and we’ll sit down for a beer”.   Sure we give HORRIBLE directions “you go down to John Yakimchuk’s place and you take a right” and if you don’t know where John Yakimchuk lives too bad  or the famous “it’s over where Pinders used to be”, we are most certainly people with crappy direction giving capabilities.  That is a province wide fault.  We have weird names for things, I get that it confuses people ” But WHY do you call it a Bunnyhug???”  We don’t know, stop asking.   BUT, I know to the tips of my toes that I could raise an army of support just because we’re from the same province.  If there was a zombie acropolis I would want to be in Saskatchewan because the people there would protect each other just because that is what we do.  I have friends from Saskatchewan from 1974.  I was FIVE.  Think about that for a minute…the people I talk to over the course of the week about anything significant have been in my life since before I could subtract 2 digit numbers.  Before I wrote in cursive, I know these folks.  They know that I had a Tootie hair cut, they know that I played clarinet in grade 6 band, they know that I loved Billy Hall from kindergarten to grade 7, they know that a girl named Michelle used to sing “Ebony and Ivory” in Miss Rashley’s grade 7 class every time I walked in.  They know the good and the bad about me and they are still in my life.  Not just one person but the majority of my friends have been in my life for at least 20 years.  I think that says something about how we were raised and what type of people we are.   Facebook as done wonders in bringing us back together, we now SEE the lives of the people we used to know and it’s wonderful in my case because even the ones I’d lost touch with for years are the same.  Crazy, sarcastic, hilarious, self deprecating, intelligent, caring people….how does that happen?  How does it happen PROVINCE wide?  I have no idea.  Maybe it’s the perogies.