Heritage Gateways

Wendy Westergard Journals

April 30, 1997

Summary: Polka dancing, weather, and more weather...

Journal entry: Greetings from The Great Plains of Nebraska!!

Last night it started to rain extremely hard around 7 p.m. The wind was extremely harsh. Genoa was the town we stayed in. This town was extemely receptive, the most we've been in so far. They were really kind. They gave us free souveniers. They were really cool. It was a shingle with the town and station burned into the wood.

As it rained, I was walking around with a poncho on. When I walked past my authentic tent I realized the tent had been blown over and all my stuff was getting wet. A couple people of our group (Paul and Amy) helped me carry all my stuff to the barn. The people of Genoa said the tent people could use the barn for the night. In fact, there were tornado warnings out that night for closer than 80 miles away. Scary. We all had a party in the barn last night. We sang songs, played the fiddle and played cards. When we woke up in the morning it was still extremely cold and extremely windy. Luckily there was only a drizzle left. I imagine we felt a lot like the pioneers last night and in the morning when we took off.

It was so cold this morning and it didn't even start to warm up until we arrived into Fullerton. We came into town frozen ice cubes. We even used some modern equipment to stay warm. Boy am I glad I'm in this century today.

Tonight it is supposed to snow. We are going to be sleeping in the 4-H building. It will be another party. Yeeha!!

Daniel Whitaker and I have become good friends after the dance 3 nights ago. We did the suicide polka. We had a lot of fun. Some times it's also called the moche pit polka because you are always bumping into someone. It a real fast paced dance. We are hoping there will be another one tonight. Daniel and I are always hangin' out together now. He is a really funny guy.