Article Reprint...  From The Patriot Ledger (Full Article)

We are in Grand Rapids, Michigan. We are in the middle of one of the most economically depressed areas of the country right now.  It is good to hear some nice news once and a while. 

 By JOANN FITZPATRICK

It’s such a big country, America. I don’t know it well, haven’t traveled from sea to shining sea, except by airplane from East to West several times. Last weekend I was in Michigan, not quite the heartland but close enough.
The combined effect of television programs, chain stores and restaurants and electronic gadgets is that we think we’ve been homogenized.
But it’s not so, thank goodness.
I know that when I visited New Orleans, before and after Hurricane Katrina, this is a place very different from Boston or anywhere else in America.
Texas, too. But what of the vast Midwest? Is it really different from New England or California?
Darned right, it is. I was in Grand Rapids, Mich., for a wedding. What I knew about Grand Rapids before going there was that it was the hometown of President Gerald Ford and site of his presidential library and museum. And also the home of Amway, though I and other out-of-town guests had only a vague idea of what Amway sells.