After 10 months in Pennsylvania as an expatriate Californian trying to unearth and analyze the cultural distinctions, I have discovered that most of them flow from one thing, and one thing only. 

Pennsylvania was built before the advent of the personal-use automobile and California after it. That's all. It may not seem like a very big distinction, but just wait, Bucks Countians. Because like every other wonderful innovation - from Internet addiction to Malibu `weight-loss bootcamps' - the scourge of Californian suburban sprawl is spreading ever Eastward. 

If you don't believe me, think about the Sam's Club in Middletown. It's the giant, chain-store warehouse on Route 1, next to the other giant, chain-store boxes: Kmart, Drug Emporium, the Sports Authority, and so on. 

Anyway, Sam (as in Sam Walton, the second-richest person in America at the time of his death) apparently ran out of space to sell his megaboxes of Kellogg's Raisin Bran because he decided to buy the last green space on Strip Shopping Strip. He wanted to build another Sam's Club, almost 30,000 square feet bigger than the first next to Kmart. 

The old building will stand empty. 

For once, township officials fought this. They didn't want to see Middletown haunted by the ghost of yet another failed megastore. They know that once the cheap plastic signs go up, they don't come down. 

That's the scary thing about this buildup: suburban sprawl is permanent. I know townships want it. They need the money for their schools, to pay their cops, to keep the sewers from bubbling over. But there's sacrifice in it too. 

And I don't know how many people in Bucks County realize the risk yet. It's something that sneaks up on you. If suburban sprawl happened overnight - if we woke up one morning to find our pine forests replaced with McDonalds - then the outcry might be greater. 

But there's another thing, even more insidious, about suburban sprawl. By its very nature, it prevents people from fighting it. According to numbers in the book "Bowling Alone," the longer a person's commute, the less time he or she spends on local politics and civic organizations. Commuters just have less time period, and they feel less connected to a place that is the functional equivalent of a nicely landscaped hotel. 

It's fine to want to live in the country - you'd just better be a farmer, or find some other way to work out there. 

Where I grew up, it was not uncommon for people to drive two hours to work, and two hours home. I would run away, like all Californians do, to the edge of the megacity, and try to find peace (and some fresh air) there. But as I grew older, that place reached farther and farther away, and eventually it became inaccessible. A Californian dream locked up inside a box. 

The solution? To get excited about zoning boards. That may sound like a tall order, but reporters manage it on a regular basis. Show up to meetings. Find out what's slated to be built. Look at the land: Are there trees, butterflies, unclaimed air left saving? Ask yourself, do we really need this parking lot here? 

You may end up keeping your rolling green state and averting an East Coast California.