I've made it through most of Nebraska, now, and can finally say I've been to the middle of the country.

I saw fireflies for the first time in St. Paul. It took a second for me to realize what they were. Then I walked up and down the streets, staring at people's lawns like an alien who'd just hit earth.

The other thing I could not imagine 'till I'd experienced it is the crazy humidity that builds up during summer. It makes me wish for a storm to release the atmospheric pressure.

When the storms do come, they are sudden and powerful. In Merna, I was almost stuck in four inches of mud after rain and hail pelted my van like buckshot, waking me up at 7 a.m.

I fell asleep one night in Whiteclay watching a pulsing lightning inferno that for hours illuminated a section of clouds beside the full moon.

The winds here are mighty, too. They pick up speed over miles of plains and have a different presence than the gusts off the coast I am used too.

People in Nebraska often come across reserved and matter-of-fact. I have learned behind that front they are generally very kind.