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MY SOUTH
Ever Vigilant ^ | Robert St. John

Posted on 02/14/2002 9:01:00 AM PST by sheltonmac

Thirty years ago I visited my first cousin in Virginia. While hanging out with his friend, the discussion turned to popular movies of the day. When I offered my two-cents on the authenticity and social relevance of the movie Billy Jack, one of the boys asked, in all seriousness; "Do you guys have movie theaters down there?" To which I replied, "Yep. We wear shoes too."

Just three years ago, my wife and I were attending a food and wine seminar in Aspen, Colorado. We were seated with two couples from Las Vegas. One of the Glitter Gulch gals was amused and downright rude when I described our restaurant as a fine-dining restaurant. "Mississippi doesn't have fine-dining restaurants!" she demanded and nudged her companion. I fought back the strong desire to mention that she lived in the land that invented the 99-cent breakfast buffet.

I wanted badly to defend my state and my restaurant with a 15-minute soliloquy and public relations rant that would surely change her mind. It was at that precise moment that I was hit with a blinding jolt of enlightenment, and in a moment of complete and absolute clarity it dawned on me -- my South is the best-kept secret in the country. Why would I try to win this woman over? She might move down here.

I am always amused by Hollywood's interpretation of the South. We are still, on occasion, depicted as a collective group of sweaty, stupid, backwards-minded and racist rednecks. The South of movies and TV, the Hollywood South, is not my South.

This is my South:

- My South is full of honest, hard-working people.

- My South is colorblind. In my South, we don't put a premium on pigment. No one cares whether you are black, white, red, or green with orange polka dots.

- My South is the birthplace of blues and jazz, and rock n' roll. It has banjo pickers and fiddle players, but it also has B.B. King, Muddy Waters, the Allman Brothers, Emmylou Harris, and Elvis.

- My South is hot.

- My South smells of newly mowed grass.

- My South was the South of The Partridge Family, Hawaii 5-0, and kick the can.

- My South was creek swimming, cane-pole fishing, and bird hunting.

- In my South, football is king, and the Southeastern Conference is the kingdom.

- My South is home to the most beautiful women on the planet.

- In my South, soul food and country cooking are the same thing.

- My South is full of fig preserves, cornbread, butter beans, fried chicken, grits and catfish.

- In my South we eat foie gras, caviar, and truffles.

- In my South, our transistor radios introduced us to the Beatles and the Rolling Stones at the same time they were introduced to the rest of the country.

- In my South, grandmothers cook a big lunch every Sunday.

- In my South, family matters, deeply.

- My South is boiled shrimp, blackberry cobbler, peach ice cream, banana pudding, and oatmeal cream pies.

- In my South people put peanuts in bottles of Coca Cola and hot sauce on almost everything.

- In my South the tea is iced and almost as sweet as the women.

- My South has air-conditioning.

- My South is camellias, azaleas, wisteria, and hydrangeas.

- In my South, the only person that has to sit on the back of the bus is the last person that got on the bus.

- In my South, people still say "yes, ma'am," "no ma'am," "please," and "thank you."

- In my South, we all wear shoes....most of the time.

My South is the best-kept secret in the country. Please continue to keep the secret....it keeps the idiots away.


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Editorial
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To: sheltonmac
- In my South, football is king, and the Southeastern Conference is the kingdom.


GO COCKS!!!!!!!!!!!

141 posted on 02/14/2002 11:08:54 AM PST by aomagrat
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To: sweetliberty
I lived most of my adult life overseas but as a native Mississippian when I returned to the South around 1996 I discovered that my tolerance for South-bashers had waned considerably. I detest them and their know it all self righteousness. They never reflect on their own skeletons in the closet...they only dance on the bones of ours. One thing we have that they don't ....and never will... is a sense of community and belonging to somewhere where it matters....

The only thing worse is a Southern South -Basher.....if one is weak enough to sacrifice their own heritage on the altar of political correctness then well....they are just weak, soft....putty... pliable...don't stand for anything ....can only whine...basically what's wrong with our nation.

Regards...and an across the river from the east bump to ya.

142 posted on 02/14/2002 11:09:46 AM PST by wardaddy
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To: wimpycat
" I was at least twelve before I got to sit at the big table"

LOL! Me too!

143 posted on 02/14/2002 11:10:04 AM PST by sweetliberty
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To: SirChas
I like to mix my fried eggs and grits together!

My favorite way to eat grits: Take a couple of over easy eggs, several strips of crumbled up bacon, butter, and a heap of grits. Mix it all together and salt and pepper to taste. Then spread the mixture on toast and enjoy. That's good eatin'!

144 posted on 02/14/2002 11:11:56 AM PST by aomagrat
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To: aomagrat
I'm gettin' hungry just reading this...
145 posted on 02/14/2002 11:14:06 AM PST by SirChas
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To: wardaddy
".....if one is weak enough to sacrifice their own heritage on the altar of political correctness then well....they are just weak, soft....putty... pliable...don't stand for anything ....can only whine...basically what's wrong with our nation."

I agree. I expect some bashing and even some good-natured ribbing from Yankees, but I am disgusted when it comes from a natural born southerner. It is disgraceful.

146 posted on 02/14/2002 11:15:11 AM PST by sweetliberty
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To: AUgrad
Yeah, and talk about cultural food sensitivities: once I took a bottle of Tabasco to the Netherlands (and you need to take your own ice, as well) and some guy in the restaurant unloaded on me for that. But yet they serve mayonnaise with their french fries like it was perfectly normal.
147 posted on 02/14/2002 11:17:32 AM PST by txhurl
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To: blam
My grandfather used to talk about his days of chopping cotton as a boy in North Alabama. My great-grandmother would cook breakfast very early each day and would not cook another meal until after dark. Lunch was leftover biscuits from breakfast. My grandfather's favorite lunch was vinegar and onion biscuits. I've tried them and lets just say it is an aquired taste.
148 posted on 02/14/2002 11:18:49 AM PST by AUgrad
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To: wimpycat
You won't have to wait too long for the return of the Tar Heels. I look forward to the next time we beat Dook!
149 posted on 02/14/2002 11:20:21 AM PST by GBA
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To: oyez
Southern Florida is now half Canadian and half Cuban. One has to feel sorry for the Cubans

Bump for my Cuban hermanos!

150 posted on 02/14/2002 11:21:22 AM PST by wardaddy
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To: txculprit
But yet they serve mayonnaise with their french fries like it was perfectly normal.

That's pure communism.

151 posted on 02/14/2002 11:22:37 AM PST by AUgrad
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To: oyez
That is southEAST Florida. SouthWEST Florida is half Mexican and half from some state in the Midwest that starts with a vowel.
152 posted on 02/14/2002 11:24:07 AM PST by crystalk
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To: txculprit
Ever had brains and eggs? Mmmmmmmm goooood.
153 posted on 02/14/2002 11:24:13 AM PST by AUgrad
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To: tscislaw
I remember my first encounter with some KKK types. I must have been about 12. Me and a friend of mine were in downtown Petersburg passing out some literature. They were some scary looking guys. Of course, having the big mouths that we had, we made fun of them.

I reckon they had movie theaters WAY back and a right good ways out in the sticks too. One of the most delightful stories I ever heard in my family was from my grandpa about a year before he died. My grandma had passed away a couple of years earlier and he was remembering her fondly as he showed me a photo of her when she was very young. He told me the story of how they got engaged. He said that one night he realized that she was the woman he wanted to marry and seeing's how she was the prettiest girl in the hills that he'd better hurry up before somebody else beat him to it. He got on his mule and rode all the way to town to the movie theater where he proposed to her right out front. Obviously she said "yes."

154 posted on 02/14/2002 11:28:14 AM PST by sweetliberty
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To: oyez
One has to feel sorry for the Cubans.

Oh, no! Not with garbanzo bean soup, black beans, rice & onions, Cuban bread (also useful as a baseball bat after the first day out of the oven), pompano paella, flan de leche, Cuban coffee, palomilla steak, caldo gallego, .....

Where's Luis Gonzalez? I bet he can fill this list out some more.

155 posted on 02/14/2002 11:28:43 AM PST by stboz
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To: txculprit
"But yet they serve mayonnaise with their french fries like it was perfectly normal."

I discovered mayonaise on french fries in New London, Connecicut in 1961. I still like FF's that way.

156 posted on 02/14/2002 11:29:01 AM PST by blam
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To: AUgrad
No, but my grandma has, so I guess it can't be all bad.

Ever chop squid heads and tentacles up into little bitty pieces and fry them and serve with marinara? MMMMMMmmmmmmm maybe we should move to a MY SOUTHERN FOOD thread...

157 posted on 02/14/2002 11:29:22 AM PST by txhurl
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To: sweetliberty
Me too....I like RedZone Yankees and those holdouts in the BlueZone. I lived in Manhattan for a while. Good natured ribbing is fine and we do deserve some criticism as well. What bothers me most is the motivation and the culture that has grown up around South bashing. It's basically a whipping boy thing.

The homegrown traitors are indeed disgraceful and we would be better served without them.

I'm hardly a neo-Confederate but I have become a staunch defender of Southern heritage and culture.....right or wrong...it's ours and we don't need outsiders lecturing us anymore. Without us, this whole country would be living in an ever-declining Dem Socialist state.

158 posted on 02/14/2002 11:30:28 AM PST by wardaddy
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To: sheltonmac
my apologies for the ignorant types that infest this great city. Only fools speak ill of places or things that they have not experienced or understand.

LVM

159 posted on 02/14/2002 11:34:39 AM PST by LasVegasMac
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To: blam
We've got a place in Vicksburg that breads their fries before frying. Really good with remoulade sauce.
160 posted on 02/14/2002 11:34:45 AM PST by stboz
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