Living out in one of the vast areas between the incorporated cities, I’m learning more daily about what passes for logic. The phone system and post office are two prime examples.
Technically, our house is on a postal rural route attached to Hebron, Indiana. Hebron isn’t that far away. I checked, and from my driveway to the grocery store is a matter of 4.5 miles. But Boone Grove is far closer. The community itself is .7 miles up the road, and the post office exactly a mile away. I can walk there and have more than once. The U.S. Postal Service considers the Boone Grove post office too small to be economically viable, and yet assigns homes that are literally close enough that you can see them from the p.o. to either Hebron or Valparaiso, which is 14 miles away. If there is any logic at all in that, I’m sure I can’t find it.
And then there’s the phone system. Neither the area code nor the local carrier differs between Valpo, Hebron, and Boone Grove, with Valpo being the furthest out. But Valpo is a local call, while Hebron is not. And Merrillville, where my husband works? Just the other side of I-65 from Valpariaso, it’s not a local call either, at least not on my land line. If I want it to be local, I use my cell phone…the one with the Indianapolis number, kept so that I would continue to be a local call for the people there.
Now, can anyone make sense out of any of this? I’m well aware that borders and boundries are generally artificial constructs, but this little red hen considers this is beyond ridiculous.
In the immortal words of you-know-who, “You’re looking for logic, and logic doesn’t apply.”
Welcome to living in rural Indiana. In Knightstown we can call 5 little bitty towns around us. None of which we have any reason to call. Half of the kids in the school system can’t call the other have because it’s long distance. We can’t even call our county seat, 15 miles away. But I can call Greenfield from Park Fletcher and it’s not long distance.