on being a stereotype

In the Keys, everyone else, like me, is from another place.  It makes it interesting: unlike Kansas, where everyone has the same easy, unaffected manner of speaking, each person you meet has a unique accent.  Working at a resort employing three hundred people, i like to listen to the different dialects against one another.  In the HR office, is a young Texan & a middle-aged Bostonian.  My department, answering phones & manning the radios, is headed by a mother from Delaware & staffed with a grandmother from Michigan & a girl from Jamaica (among others, whom i rarely work with.)  Early in the morning, as the sun rises, i ride to work with men from the maintenance department who are from South Carolina, Tennessee, & New Jersey.

It's also great for conversation.  Asking where a person's from can easily segue into why they left, & what they're doing here.  You can learn a lot about a person very quickly.  Which is good, given that, for the first time in decades, i do not know everybody.  Quite contrarily: i know no one, & have little in common with anyone.  So i like being able to eat up minutes of small talk with that one question, & it's nice to get to know someone without needing to do much of the talking.

Obviously, this line of questioning usually veers next to where i am from.  The love of Kansas is deep in my heart, & i am not embarrassed by my newness to this place.  However, it's still awkward.  I think the main weirdness stems from the fact that i seem to be the only Kansan anyone has ever met.  Clearly, everyone has heard of the mythological state - Oz, evolution, tornadoes - but as far as i can tell, they assume nothing ventures to or from this bible-belt bread-bowl but wheat & beef.  I go suddenly from feeling like everyone else - transplanted like a seed in the island breeze - to feeling like an overwhelming stereotype - Kansas farm-girl with a boyfriend back home.  

Of course, no one knows about Lawrence.  About Thai/Vietnamese/Indian food, or gourmet coffee.  No one knows about my lip piercings, or that i break dress code with my 'extreme style' earrings: no one has seen me out of the 'island elegance' business-casual dress composed of all the clothes i own that could fit into the required category of 'conservative'.  It is a strange feeling, knowing no one, & being unknown to everyone.  To no longer be the girl back home, missing a few far away friends, but to now be the far away friend, missing everyone back home.