How To Act Like A Northerner

When you move to the north, no one really tells you what to expect. And some people call it culture shock, but sometimes it's less, it's so cold here and more, what am I doing here? There's a different personality, different sorts of expectations, and the sun doesn't come out for 6 whole months. Everyone wears a Northface...October through April. Leggings as pants? Dunkin Donuts? No one smiles? What is this?

I can't say that nobody warned me. The summer before I left for college, I got plenty of warning. "But everyone's so mean!" "Why not go to UT?" "But it snows year-round!" I can say that I didn't care to listen. I was coming to Boston no matter what, and none of those things were going to stand in my way.

So after I've survived two years of riding the T and learning how to understand a Boston accent, I feel obligated to lend my advice to anyone in a similar situation. So here it is:

5 Ways To Act Like A Northerner:

5. Don't talk to strangers. No, really.
If I'm in Tennessee, whether I'm at the supermarket, craft store, or park, it is socially acceptable (and socially encouraged) to speak to people I don't know. In fact, the last time I was in town visiting, a woman at Michaels asked me which of two scrapbook sticker packages were cuter. If we had been copied and pasted into New England, someone would have gotten hurt. People get freaked out if you speak to them in line, or even act friendly. If you feel like acting like a yankee, just don't be polite! A bonus? Actually be rude to people while driving. Honk, flip other drivers the bird, cut everyone off - totally acceptable!

4. Care about (northern) baseball teams.
Now, where I'm from, we actually have two words for competitive physical activity: "sport," and "football." 99% of the population knows everything there is to know about football before the age of 5. If you're a Tennesseean and you don't know what bleeding orange is, something's wrong. But in the north, they only like the Patriots. They spend all of their remaining time caring about baseball, which is sometimes hard to understand. By default, I love the Red Sox. It's just that I've never seen them win anything! If you want to act like a northerner, be prepared to love the game of baseball; the players, the teams, famous plays, you name it. Oh, and a bonus is knowing which teams to hate - know how we all feel about the Gators? Channel all of it toward the Yankees.

3. Learn how to enjoy Dunkin Donuts.
As a seasoned Starbucks drinker, this one has been a challenge to me. Starbucks coffee is perfect! You can get it hot, cold, frozen, sweet, bitter, whatever you like. But you might find that a Starbucks is hard to come by. In exchange, we get Dunkin Donuts ("Dunkin," "Dunkin D's," "Life Source," etc). Don't get me wrong, they have amazing doughnuts. But their coffee is terrible! At best, you can land an iced coffee that has actually been stirred. At worst, you'll never want coffee again. The Starbucks addiction comes back from time to time, but just remember that you like Dunkin now, and make sure to talk about it a lot. Try something with vanilla so maybe it will be bearable.

2. Get a membership at the tanning bed.
Tanning isn't for everyone, and in fact, it's incredibly bad for you. But it's a lose-lose situation here: The sun literally does not come out for months. It goes down one night in October, and the next thing you know, it's snowing. At 3 PM, it looks like midnight. When you're used to sunny summers, crisp falls, and brief winters that lead into that season they call spring (not like I remember what that is), it's tough to deal with the half-year of winter. Watch the weather channel and try to cheer up, it'll be over soon! And by soon I mean it will be July before you can stop shivering. If you wanted to hold onto your southern tan, better check into the tanning salon for a few more months.

1. Shop at Anthropologie
After I saw the same "flowing" black shirt for the 15th time, I suspected something was up. Most of my friends back home spend their time in flowery dresses, colorful headbands, and cowboy boots. Those are the things that I always thought were beautiful! But in the north, they like Anthropologie. There's this look that you absolutely have to have: Barely any makeup, flowing top, leggings, and big tall boots. Perhaps you could accuse us of being a bit of a cookie-cutter-culture in Tennessee, but we have nothing on Bostonians. Moving to the north? Get to shopping! And make sure everything you buy is black, with a bit of white and gray for some flavor.

If you move to the north, things are different! But that doesn't mean you have to be. It's so much better to just forget that being a southerner is sometimes ridiculed; after all, they do weird stuff, so why can't we?