Monday, June 25, 2018

Utah: A Transplant's Perspective




            Utah: Life Elevated – that’s the message on the license plates, but does it ring true for the people who live here? Having lived in hot and humid North Carolina for most of my life, the cross-country move to Utah last August took my family way outside our comfort zone. I’d been to Provo and Salt Lake City a few times, so my expectations for Logan were low. I was pleasantly surprised by the area. There is no other word to describe Logan except ‘beautiful.’
As an outsider, I was familiar with the stereotypical Utahan, who is LDS (Mormon), has a large family, an even larger garden, and always seems to be smiling. Many Utahans come from pioneer ancestries and the surnames reflect that heritage: Benson, Bingham, Eccles, Hansen, Jensen, Jorgensen, Larsen, Madsen, Marriott, McConkie, Monson, Mortenson, Olsen, Nelson, Petersen, Smith (got lots of those), Zollinger – and that’s just in my ward (LDS congregation), which covers four square blocks of my neighborhood. Contrast that to my former ward which covers fourteen square miles. All of our neighbors are Mormons like us. Is that cool, or is that kind of weird? Maybe a little of both. Here’s what I’ve observed about the natives:
Utahans love the outdoors, and who can blame them if you live in Cache County? It’s absolutely beautiful with rolling fields, Logan River, farms, mountains, Utah State University campus, and an old-fashioned downtown, crowned with the Tabernacle and the Logan Temple, which can be seen from almost any spot in the valley. Most Loganites (is that a word?) own an ATV, camper, boat, mountain bike, skis, or all the above. We live right at the mouth of Green Canyon, which is a beautiful place to bike and hike, and we’re just two miles from the mouth of Logan Canyon, which is spectacular year-round, and offers a forty-mile scenic drive to Bear Lake, which is also gorgeous. Did I mention this place is beautiful?
It’s true about the big gardens. Most residents have one, plus fruit trees, and some have chickens. And we’re not talking about farms – we live in the suburbs. These are backyard gardens that are kept green with ‘water shares’ – another Utah quirk. It’s dry here so the pioneers took advantage of the snow-capped mountains, moving the melt waters down into the valley for the spring and summer. Logan has lots of canals, and most houses can tap into them for irrigation water.
Let me mention the houses because they’re all different. I come from an area of cookie cutter neighborhoods with militant HOAs that must be appeased to paint your shutters a different color, and they send you stern letters if you leave your garage door open for ten minutes. There’s none of that in Logan unless you want to pay a premium to live in a fancy neighborhood up the mountainside (called ‘the benches’ in Utah-speak). Logan is a hodge-podge of architecture. If you find a spot of land to build on, you can build whatever type of house you want, and people have been doing it for 150 years. Brick ranches sit next to Craftsmen, with a smattering of modern, farmhouse, and what-were-they-thinking houses. It’s never boring. People often sell the back portions of their long lots so there are interesting newer houses built behind old homes on ‘flag lots.’ There are no two houses alike, which is refreshing when you come from cookie-cutter.
And you can never get lost! The numbered grid street layout is unique to Utah, although I think parts of Idaho and Arizona do it too. It’s so easy to find your way around. Sure there are streets with names, but you have to pull out Google maps to find them. Once you know where you are on the grid, it’s easy to find your way around. And it’s no exaggeration that there are LDS chapels on every block. We can walk to our church building, even in winter. It’s only two blocks from our front door.
Speaking of houses – most Utahans have a unique room in their basements (everyone has basements!) called ‘cold storage’. This is where the suburban farmers store their food. All those lovely cherries, apricots, peaches, pears, green beans, tomatoes, corn – Loganites have to do something with them, so they’re canned for later. Most cold storage rooms also have a bin for potatoes. Potatoes are inexpensive since we’re so close to Idaho, but these spuds are nothing like the fist-size ‘Russets’ you buy at Walmart. These are the size of footballs. Two are all you need to make mashed potatoes for Thanksgiving dinner. Utahans love to grow, freeze, can, and otherwise preserve their own food. Being self-sufficient isn’t just a lofty goal here, Utahans take it seriously. Ever heard of a ‘case lot’ sale? This is when the grocery stores sell canned goods cheap, by the case. We like our cold storage rooms, and we prefer to keep them full.  
Speaking of cold, let me be the first to say I love the weather here. Yes, we get snow. Lots of it. Unlike NC, where a dusting shuts down everything for days, Utahans adapt well to snow. We shovel the driveway and get on with our lives. The summer is shorter, but that’s a good thing. The air is dry so it’s actually difficult to work up a sweat – unlike NC, where you sweat anytime you step outside the air conditioning from April to October. Here, we run the AC maybe ten days the entire summer. It cools off at night so we leave the windows open and enjoy the night air. Did I mention there are very few bugs? Yes, I relish the long snowy winter because it means no mosquitoes!
Let me get back to my original thought: Life elevated. The people here are genuinely friendly to LDS and non-LDS alike. They make great neighbors. There is little crime (I can only speak for Logan – I know the rest of Utah isn’t perfect.) Even if you’re not LDS, you might appreciate the temples that dot the state. Each is unique, beautiful, and important to the LDS faith. I’ve only been inside a few but hope to visit them all. The temple is the pinnacle of our faith, and I urge you to attend any temple open house so you can see inside the House of God before it’s dedicated. (After dedication, only members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in good standing can enter the temple.) The covenants we make in the temple are sacred, not secret. To me, ‘life elevated’ is reflected in the spires of the temple, to know that families can be together forever.
Enjoy the journey. Look to God and live. I could say a lot more but I know I’m rambling at this point. I’m thankful we moved to Logan, Utah. It has elevated our life in ways we couldn’t have imagined. This NC transplant is very happy here.