The Minneapolitan Prince

When I moved to New York a few years ago and people would ask me where I’m from, I’d say Minneapolis. I’d get only a handful of responses. No one would really know much about the city: Sometimes they’d think it’s a 45,000-population village where everyone sounds like they do in Fargo, or they’d know nothing at all, or in the charitable moments, they might have been there or have family from there.

For any of the moments when people were unaware, I’d really only have to rattle off a few names to give my hometown some context.

“You know, it’s where Prince and Bob Dylan are from.”

If they were a bigger music junky, I’d say something like, “We brought you Prince, Bob Dylan, The Replacements, Hüsker Dü…” I might even bring out the Information Society if they’re really into music.

Or maybe I’d throw out one of our political…