When we pulled out into the winter night and the real snow, our snow, began to stretch out beside us and twinkle against the windows, and thedim lights of small Wisconsin stations moved by, a sharp wild bracecame suddenly into the air. We drew in deep breaths of it as we walkedback from dinner through the cold vestibules, unutterably aware of ouridentity with this country for one strange hour, before we meltedindistinguishably into it again. That's my Middle West--not the wheat or the prairies or the lost Swedetowns, but the thrilling returning trains of my youth, and the streetlamps and sleigh bells in the frosty dark and the shadows of hollywreaths thrown by lighted windows on the snow.