As a child growing up in South Dakota, I always remember riding in the car in the dark and seeing the lights of houses so far away that they looked like little boats on the ocean. It always gave me the creeps. I still get creeped out driving across the prairie, it's so desolate. Even in the daytime it's just vast and ugly (most of the year) and it's completely infested with billboards.
That’s all there is interstate and dirt roads. A highway here or there but if you want to get where you’re going interstate is your main or only option.
Then you go up to Harding county in the northwest corner and look up at night to see every damned star in the sky along with the milky way’s disk. Biggest town for an hour is Buffalo, population ~300.
It can definitely be beautiful in the right context. I grew up way out in the middle of nowhere where there was no light pollution. I have a very foundational memory of my parents waking me up at like 2 in the morning when I was maybe 7 years old? We went out on the deck and I got to see the aurora borealis. Only time I've ever seen it.
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u/CaptHoshito 26d ago
As a child growing up in South Dakota, I always remember riding in the car in the dark and seeing the lights of houses so far away that they looked like little boats on the ocean. It always gave me the creeps. I still get creeped out driving across the prairie, it's so desolate. Even in the daytime it's just vast and ugly (most of the year) and it's completely infested with billboards.