It was ridiculously wonderful to be back in New York! Even after a long day of cross-country travel, I still couldn’t contain my glee. To my sister’s amusement, my delight overflowed into spontaneous happy dances on the street corners waiting for the WALK sign. “I’m in New York, I’m in New York.”

Going home is special. Special in a particular way for those of us who now live in a different region of the country, where the customs of speech, interaction and humor are different.

I live just outside of Portland, Oregon. Like my home state of New York, the Pacific Northwest is a land of stunning beauty, of evergreen trees in more shades of green than a paint store has samples. It’s the land of rugged mountain peaks, hidden neighbors during much of the winter, until, suddenly, the weather shifts and they’re standing on your doorstep. Hello! Here we are!

Temperamentally, however, Portland and New York are as different from each other as the 3,000 miles which separate them.

Take handling interpersonal conflict, as an example. Conflict animates New Yorkers; it terrifies Portlanders. Don’t believe the myth of the Oregon Trail being a route to the west coast for intrepid migrants looking for gold or a new beginning. Nope; it was created by droves of families willing to risk their necks and those of their kin to get the heck away from those loud, bossy, annoying New Yorkers.

Portlanders assiduously avoid conflict, even minor conflicts like honking a car horn. Their approach to conflict is the same as it is to snow; if we do nothing and stay inside, maybe it will go away.

Portland drivers are so adverse to honking, that they will sit through another sequence (or two) of traffic lights rather than honk to tell the idiot — I mean, “individual currently not paying attention, but hey I don’t always pay attention when I should either, so I can’t really judge them” — driver ahead of them to get moving.

When I talk to other ex-Pat east coasters, they nod their heads in agreement and roll their eyes when I mention the difference in humor between the Northeast and Pacific Northwest. Good golly, any humor with a bite will upset a Portlander. After twenty-five years, I still haven’t bridged the difference in what’s considered funny. With even the mildest sarcasm verboten, half of my humor repertoire was wiped out the moment I pulled into my sister’s driveway in Federal Way, WA, in the summer of 1997.

Not only do Northwesterners not see the humor in sarcasm, they’re offended by it. Either they are hurt themselves or on behalf of someone else—a favorite indoor sport, having hurt feelings on behalf of a perceived victim, either individual or group; and will immediately shut the conversation down, usually by walking away.

Walking away, ignoring disagreeable information or people, is a trademark of this region. It’s as infuriating as it is excruciating. I don’t recall anyone in NY ever ignoring me when I was speaking directly to them. So, when it first happened here, I thought it was a hearing problem, and I’d repeat myself, only more loudly.

It is the single custom of my adopted home town that I can neither comprehend nor abide. The silent treatment is a quintessential passive aggressive means of control. Between intimates, it is just cruel. I’d far rather be chided than ignored.

I tend to lead conversations with humor. I was in my element in New York! My sister would learn strangers’ stories – her great gift, and I’d try to make people laugh. If they didn’t at least smile, I’d move on. (I do the same here and move on a lot.) If they did laugh, I’d stay engaged and up the outrageous ante, as would they, each of us appreciating the other.

Then the light would change, and I’d move on, happy, content and filled with the sense that I’d come home.