South of What?

The beloved blogger Juancho's post yesterday on Motor Touring got me to thinking about some things. Mainly, what it means in these days and times to identify as being a Southerner here in the United States of America.

I know what our reputation is in the rest of the country and perhaps in the rest of the world. We're all a bunch of redneck hicks who are malevolent racists who drive trucks with well-stocked gun racks in the back and a Confederate flag on our license plates.

Okay. That last part could actually happen if The Sons of Confederate Veterans can push through the legislation they're proposing to offer a vanity plate with the stars and bars on it although it's not looking like it'll pass.

"It's about heritage, not hate," they say, which is what they always say but that's such a crock of shit that I won't even give it the dignity of a response except to say that so are white sheets with slitty eye holes cut out of them if you look at it in a certain way.

A hateful, crock-of-shit way but yes, there is heritage there too.

Anyway, where was I?

Oh yeah. I'm a Southern woman and wondering what that means. It's hard to define. Virginia Southern is completely different from Georgia Southern which is completely different from North Florida Southern which is light worlds away from being South Florida Southern which is not really Southern at all.

The media certainly loves to stereotype the South, but I doubt I'd fit into those stereotypes and neither would most of my family or friends.

We don't (sadly) wear cut-offs that say Dixielicious on the ass (had to do that, Juancho) and we don't hate people because of their race and we use fairly good grammar and we don't marry our siblings or even our cousins and we don't eat grits at every meal. Mostly only breakfast.
We go to the dentist, we are sometimes insanely left-leaning when it comes to politics and we enjoy culture as much as the next person. Of course that culture may include smoked mullet, raw oysters, Bud-Lite and bluegrass.

Or it may include sushi, a crisp Cabernet and the symphony.

The point is, we can't be pigeon-holed any more than any other group of people.
The village I live in, my community, is a very mixed place, racially, economically, politically, and just about every other way I can imagine. We have college professors, musicians, preachers, (there must be two dozen churches within a ten-mile radius of my house), store-keepers, business owners, construction workers, artists, state workers, mechanics, school teachers, food service workers, farmers, possible drug dealers, AME'ers, Catholics, Pentecostals, atheists, hippies, professional business people, and of course me- the one remaining housewife in the world, at least for this moment. We are the descendants of slaves and plantation owners. We are the sons and daughters of Yankee carpet baggers and poor white sharecroppers. We are Mexicans, here to work and learning the language. We have nothing in common if viewed from certain angles, but when we meet at the post office we smile and hold the door open and say, "How you doin' today?" When I moved here four years ago and began to walk for exercise and to explore, it was a common occurrence for people in cars or trucks to stop and inquire in a concerned manner if I needed a ride.

I believe I am probably known as that crazy white white who walks around these parts and I sort of like that.

And maybe that's what I like about the south in general. We may not actively celebrate diversity but we certainly do find it interesting and generally tolerate it. In my experience, the unusual and the eccentric and the border-line crazy person are not looked upon with disdain in the south, but with curiosity. We may talk about these people (or be talked about if we are one of them) but that's fine. Talk is what we do. Talk is what we enjoy. And when we talk about someone who has, um, shall we say- differences? we very frequently add a "bless her heart" to the end of the conversation as a sort of smoothing over of the karmetic waters which we may have roiled or perhaps just as a sop to the idea implanted into us by our foremothers that we should always "be sweet," which is another thing about the South that I love. We try to be sweet, most of us, most of the time.

Being born a Southerner is no more of an accomplishment than being born a citizen of the United States but I take comfort in the fact that I was. My grandparents on my mother's side of the family were all Yankees although they moved to the South before they began raising their family but I still feel the uncomfortable tug of those Yankee roots sometimes. When visiting the family farm up in Pennsylvania I feel like the veritable fish out of water. I look around the rural area and all I see is extremely neat and tidy white houses with extremely neat and tidy white people and I am so grateful that Granddaddy moved to Chattanooga in time for me never to have to live up there. It's just not where I feel comfortable.

Where I feel comfortable is right here in my old house in North Florida with its three porches to sit on and talk with friends who have come over for beer and supper.

I feel comfortable living in a community with people of all colors who live in houses of all colors. I love the fact that on some Saturdays churches have fish fries in the little park by the post office and I can buy a fish sandwich which is a piece of fried mullet between two slices of white bread and there is always hot sauce to put on it. I feel a great sense of comfort studying the gravestones in the little cemetery I discovered in the woods nearby where the oldest person buried there was born in 1821. I love the fact that there's a house down the road where there are three flags flown daily and proudly and they are: the American flag, the State Flag of Florida and a gloriously colored rainbow flag. It is right next to the junk-dealer's house where there are goats and chickens and an alpaca in the yard and I often wonder how that works out, but it seems to.

I choose not to literally fly a flag but I suppose I do, in a way, when I put on my walking shoes and hit the road. We all fly our flags in one way or another.
Mine says that I'm the crazy white lady who walks and yours may say you're the gay person who lives next to the junk dealer's house with the alpaca in the yard.

Amen. Let's all get along and show a little Southern pride by not throwing our trash on the road.

And oh yes- bless our hearts.