Taking a couple diversions from the usual straight shot on I-5 last weekend, I travelled both west and east of the interstate to cross the Skagit river, testing alternate routes around the collapsed I-5 bridge over the river. To the west I drove through the rural Skagit Valley, past tidy homes with immaculate lawns and neatly plowed fields. To the east I drove up highway 9, through thick forests and picturesque lakes in the the Cascade foothills. Both routes are all but invisible from the freeway, which runs through the lowest, flattest points and thereby cuts most of the land off from view.
Driving up I-5, the surrounding landscape looks beautiful but foreboding — there are towering, snow-capped mountains looming over thickly wooded, gray-green hills. To the west, Puget Sound and the Strait of Juan de Fuca stretch out toward the Pacific, hemmed in by the Olympic mountains and interrupted here and there by dark islands that rise out of the water like the backs of giant leviathons. This is the outsider’s view of a grand, imposing natural world that looks wild and inhospitable from the vantage point of the densely populated urban strip that runs north between the mountains and the sound. It’s an impression that is comforting to many city people, who imagine they are living in a populated island in the midst of the wilderness, both close to and yet insulated from the wild. But it isn’t really an accurate impression.
My little diversions reminded me of what I knew conceptually, but too often ignore from my neighborhood in the middle of the largest metropolitan area north of the Bay Area and west of Chicago. It reminded me that there is a civilization beyond the city, and a surprisingly diverse and healthy one at that. I should explain what I mean by diverse: it is not diverse in the polyglot, multicultural urban sense, but rather in terms of lifestyle. There are at least three general ways of life in exurban western Washington: the coastal, the farmland and the forest. There is significant overlap, but you are generally one or another depending on occupation and neighborhood.
Most exotic to me were the farmers, who live in the river valleys that sweep down from the mountains to the sea. To a city dweller, the farmers are at once familiar and distinct. They live near towns on orderly roads in neighborhoods that have an aura of both prosperity and thrift. Aside from the dimensions of their properties and the ubiquitous livestock, there is not that much to distinguish where they live from a conservative, middle-class suburban neighborhood, but there is an important difference: their homes are also their offices. They are people who work where they live. Rather than commute many miles to some sequestered parcel of land that serves as an office park, they get up and go to work in their front yards. Even those who work in town have a commute that most city people would envy. I find it ironic that despite lower population density, these people still manage to keep their work closer to home.
The coastal peoples are those who dwell in working towns on Puget Sound. Many work in shipping, transportation and associated industries such as timber mills and refineries, or the US Navy, which has a large presence in the area. They are essentially industrial workers, and in many respects closer to city people than other rural people, both politically and in terms of lifestyle. The biggest difference is that they have direct access to the bounty of nature, and don’t need to make an expedition out of a boating or fishing trip, or hunting in the woods for that matter.
The forest dwellers are a mixed lot. The main industry in the forests is logging, but only a minority actually works in that. The communities in the woods make do with a mixed economy of timber, farming, service and government jobs, and contain a significant number of retirees and urban refugees. In many respects, the forest is the most beautiful landscape in the region. While driving along on the back roads, you’ll be following some winding creek through rolling, thickly forested hills, and suddenly the scene will open up and a pristine lake or sweeping valley will be revealed. The dwellings range from run down shacks on gravel roads to giant lakeside estates, so there is a bit of a feudal air to the area, but that may be explained by the fact that natural beauty lures the poor as well as the rich.
What is remarkable about all these communities is that, despite being essentially invisible from an urban perspective, they are quite robust, and at least here in Washington state they are growing.
However, according to census statistics, despite modest population growth rural areas continue to decline relative to cities, which are gaining population from immigration. But the statistics can be misleading, because metropolitan areas have been defined as including a good deal of what is essentially rural land, so a farmer or logger who lives in east Snohomish county would be counted as “urban,” despite having little engagement with the city.
What I suspect is happening is that there is a great deal of movement from traditional suburbs and cities to nearby “exurban” or rural neighborhoods, and a change in lifestyle that isn’t reflected in standard population statistics. So most of these neighborhoods and towns I described are technically considered “urban,” despite being culturally and practically rural.
From any one perspective, it’s difficult to get a sense of the changing texture of the American population, but if one avoids the main routes, as I was forced to do by a collapsed bridge, and travels through every stage from city center to wilderness an emergent cultural bifurcation reveals itself. The contrast between central Seattle and the growing exurban neighborhoods is stark. Instead of rainbow flags adorning shops and homes, the stars and stripes flies above. Instead of dogs in parks, there are children. Community churches in the city tend to be unobtrusive and tucked away, whereas they are prominent in the “invisible” communities. In fact, what may best characterize the difference between urban and non-urban America is that those things that are hidden in the city are on display in the country, and vice versa. And, for all I know, the city is as invisible to the people in the country as their communities are to us city dwellers.
So how is this relevant to men in the US? It suggests that we have a choice, and perhaps more autonomy in living the kind of life we prefer than we did in the past. Now that it’s clear that two Americas are emerging, each with its own perks and drawbacks, we can make use of this new reality to pursue our life goals.
If you’d like to raise a family, for example, it would be best to arrange your life so that you could live outside of the urban cultural area. If, on the other hand, you have no desire to get married and raise children, the urban culture offers more in the way of companionship and convenience for the single man (although this is not a hard and fast rule). Cities obviously offer more sexual variety and opportunity, but they tend to limit reproductive potential. There are many other differences. Do you prefer “ethnic” food or fresh food? Do you like a quiet afternoon fishing in the river, or a shopping excursion downtown? Do you like being free from official oversight, or do you want a cop on every corner to keep you safe?
I think we’re at a unique point in US history in which men have a great deal of choice if they are aware of the options. Personally, I find it liberating to know that I am not tied down to either culture, and with some planning I may be able to enjoy the best of both.
