Spring is a time when we are one nation. In a few weeks, the South will head toward its air-conditioned caves and a cold summer chill will fall on San Francisco, but in spring and fall we are one people, more unum than pluribus, stepping gracefully to the music of photosynthesis, and not even a sour economy can change that, so viva sweet spring. I say this as the father of a sandy-haired gap-toothed daughter who jumps up from breakfast to dance the shimmy. With so much pre-adolescence going on around you, it's hard to be glum.

Here in Minnesota, spring doesn't arrive for good until Mother's Day and the opening of walleye season, when men and their mothers go fishing and sit around the campfire afterward and pass the whiskey bottle as she talks about her years traveling with the tent show before she met their father, all the wonderful men she knew, ducktailed men with big tattoos on their chests who drove fast cars and carried rolls of fifties and weren't afraid to spend. It's a shock, to hear about Mother's wild roving years, but everyone did have them, so get over it. And the urge to rove wildly does strike people at this time of year. I, for example, am tempted to bleach my hair and change my name to Lauren L'Etranger, though probably I will not.

In spring, a person's thoughts naturally turn toward what you would rather be doing than earning a living, and in America this usually means Being An Artist. This is the true American dream. Winning the lottery is a faint hope, becoming a sports hero is a daydream, but publishing poetry is the ambition of one-third of the American people and another third are thinking about writing a memoir.

And you thought you were the only one! Ha! You are part of a vast tide. One reason the economy is so sour is that nobody wants to tote barges or lift bales, they want to be edgy and multilayered and express their anguish in some colorful and inexplicable way. Your dental hygienist is a poet ("Into the ravenous maw flecked with food and decked with plaque, I descend, pick in hand"), and this does not make for better dental care. People who feel they have a Higher Calling may feel justified in slacking off on the Lower Calling. Your mailman comes sweeping up the walk on the tips of his toes, arms extended, twirls, and hands you an invitation to his dance recital. Also a handful of your neighbor's mail.

That is the challenge when people you know become artists. They want to know what you think, and you have to frame compliments that are enthusiastic without sounding stupid. "I loved what you did" is good, and "There was so much life in it." If you can't think of anything, just look stunned and shake your head and say, "Wow." Don't go for big phrases like "magical realism" or "pediatric apotheosis." Just tell them you loved it and help yourself to the cheese and crackers.

Garrison Keillor's "A Prairie Home Companion" airs 6 to 8 p.m. Saturday on radio station KHPR 88.1 and 6 to 8 p.m. Sunday on KIPO 89.3. His column appears Wednesday at www.honoluluadvertiser.com/opinion and in Sunday's Focus section.

Reach Garrison Keillor at (Unknown address).