(2 of 10)
>Orthodontist Richard Paulson, 39, lives with his wife Betty Ann and two daughters in the Minneapolis suburb of Golden Valley. In the woods behind his large rambling house, Paulson likes to take his children walking to see woodchucks, mallards, chipmunks and an occasional fox. They feed pheasant on their lawn. The Paulsons attend church ten minutes away in downtown Minneapolis, and in the summers vacation on the thickly wooded shores of sparkling, uncrowded Gull Lake, 2½ hours north of the Twin Cities. "I feel fortunate," says Paulson, "that we can still taste the things that 50 years ago people took for granted."
Theater buffs, the Paulsons have not missed a show at the Guthrie Theater since it opened in 1963. They occasionally attend the Minnesota Orchestra and frequently visit art shows at Minneapolis' Walker Art Center. "There is a certain peace in our existence," says Paulson, who admits, "You can lose yourself in this Utopia. It's so easy not to be confronted by the needs of others." For that reason, the Paulsons have become social activists—working in local politics and serving as youth volunteers.
>Chuck Ruhr, 36, owner of a Minneapolis ad agency, lives a long commute—by Minneapolis standards—from his office. But he can make the 25 miles of freeway in 30 or 40 minutes, likes to point out that within an hour after leaving work, he can be sitting on his pontoon boat in the middle of White Bear Lake, enjoying a drink and watching the sun go down. He and his wife and two children live in a 1912-vintage five-bedroom house on the shores of the lake, with their own beach and dock. His wife's optometry business is three blocks away; stores and schools are just as close. Says Ruhr: "There is a little less of the bad things here—drugs, pollution. Being way up here, people have had a chance to see the crest of the wave coming and react to it. There's an attitude, too, that we've got a nice little thing and let's keep it that way."
>Arleen Kulis, 24, migrated to Minneapolis from Chicago seven years ago. At first, she did not like it: the winters were formidable; the people seemed a bit provincial. But then she began savoring the lack of traffic, the safety of the streets, the camping weekends. "No one ever bothers you on the streets," she says. "You listen to the news in the morning, and there aren't 20 million murders."
>Blaine Harstad, 44, a Minneapolis lawyer, has never forgotten his farm upbringing. Like other Minnesotans, he remains drawn to the land. Three times a year, he returns to the family farm near Harmony in the southeast part of the state. He loves to listen to the school-closing notices on snowy mornings to see if Harmony is mentioned. The small-town flavor of the Twin Cities appeals to him. As Harstad points out, he knows just about every one of the 2,500 lawyers there, either directly or indirectly. "I can walk two blocks," he says, "and meet five people I know."
Minnesota has its drawbacks. Its winters are as hard as the Ice Age, and in the summers, mosquitoes often seem half the size of dive bombers. Unemployment outside the Twin Cities area is troublesome, and personal income taxes are the highest in the nation. Duluth residents worry about possible