If You Ever Come to Western Nebraska

Come in late summer, early autumn. Come when the cornfields stand up straight and tall — holding ears full of two seasons of hard farm work. Find someone who can get you a dozen of the sweet kind. You’ll be hard-pressed to find better.

Seek out a good place to watch the sky. Sit with a cold glass of whatever you choose as the thunderheads roll east from the mountains. In the afternoon, they might sweep overhead, spitting a little rain, more show than substance. Don’t wish for more. Tornadoes are on the bucket lists of fools. People with no sympathy or understanding for the destruction they cause.

It’s even better at night. Spread a blanket on a dry prairie hill — there’s enough public land here for that — and let the breeze keep the mosquitoes away. As long as the moon isn’t too bright, and it can be bright enough to light up the farm land below, the sky will glow with all the celestial bodies the naked eye can see. Satellites travel at a speed that seems unlikely. Asteroids collide with the atmosphere and break apart in streaks of light. A true dark sky location.