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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: f.Christian
the rest is Deliverance...Bush Country!

Did someone say "Deliverance"? You're gonna pray for me, boy, you're gonna pray for me real good!

81 posted on 02/14/2002 9:59:11 AM PST by wimpycat
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To: SERE_DOC
"Your south where family trees don't branch!"

You mean states where there are 5 million people and 15 last names? Yep, that's my south too. Well, we are BIG on family.

82 posted on 02/14/2002 10:01:21 AM PST by sweetliberty
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To: wimpycat
Watch it...I'm 51% damn Yankee and the rest Hawaiian!
83 posted on 02/14/2002 10:02:28 AM PST by f.Christian
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To: sheltonmac
I thoroughly agree with the writer's conclusion concerning the woman from Las Vegas. They's jes some folks what we don wanna have movin ta this neck ov the woods. No way. (She sounds lack a no-count, ennyway.)

Bump fer the South.

Congressman Billybob

Phil & Billybob in the mornings, daily.

Billybob on the Net, weekly.

84 posted on 02/14/2002 10:05:16 AM PST by Congressman Billybob
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To: jgrubbs
Well, except for the panhandle you can't really consider Florida the south. The South is a way of life, not simply a geographical location.
85 posted on 02/14/2002 10:05:54 AM PST by sweetliberty
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To: LADYAK
Since I am from the south I wanted to add a few things left out. My South also has: *Rice pudding and tapioca *Swamp cabbage *Mosquitos, chiggers, and fireflies *The biggest roaches you have seen *Alligators & snakes *Good fishing *Tornadoes and hurricanes *Nice beaches

You forgot fire ants, kudzu, no-see-ums, those neat lizards whose tails come off when you try to catch them, tire swings, fans with funeral home advertisements, shelling butter beans on the porch, children washing their dirty feet before getting into bed, collards, men standing around smoking outside between Sunday School and church, and "Texas Pete" hot sauce.

86 posted on 02/14/2002 10:08:05 AM PST by wimpycat
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To: sheltonmac
DIXIE BUMP!!
87 posted on 02/14/2002 10:08:39 AM PST by TomServo
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To: The Shrew
A Gentleman Southerner is never rude unintentionally.

We Texans are pretty sure we're Southerners... we love and identify with all the other eastern =======>> Southerners, but we are perplexed at why they've outlawed beef for Bar-B-Qs.

One of those things you would love to understand but are too polite to bring up.

88 posted on 02/14/2002 10:09:06 AM PST by txhurl
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To: f.Christian
You're the one who brought up "Deliverance", so you gotta squeal like a pig!!! LOL!
89 posted on 02/14/2002 10:09:19 AM PST by wimpycat
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To: MrConfettiMan
Hello MCM!

Unfortunately work is intruding on my FReeping activities right now so I will have to read this more thoroughly later.
I will, however add that:

My South has the best basketball in the country, and I'm talkin' ACC, baby!

Right now, in the top 25, there is Duke, Maryland, Wake Forest & N.C. State!
Note there is *no* University of North Carolina. Every time they lose another game, it warms my heart, I tell ya!

Seriously, hope you are doing well and thanks for the ping.

FRegards,
CD

90 posted on 02/14/2002 10:10:11 AM PST by Constitution Day
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To: Constitution Day
NC State is having a pretty good season this year. Now that Dean Smith's gone, we know what the secret to UNC-CH's success was. Poor things! I wonder if their fans will be as loyal as ECU fans?
91 posted on 02/14/2002 10:14:45 AM PST by wimpycat
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To: cav68
"I grew up up around Smithfield"

I grew up in Chesterfield County in southern Virginia and there is no ham in the world that equals Smithfield ham in my opinion. I haven't had any for years and I sure do miss it! It isn't even readily available in other parts of the south that I have seen. I was completely spoiled by the food I grew up with, almost all of it home grown and home made. When I have lived away from the south (far too much of my life) everything tasted like cardboard in comparison. I'm glad to be back in the south cause there's no other place like it on earth.

92 posted on 02/14/2002 10:15:15 AM PST by sweetliberty
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To: wimpycat
Yup! Those additions sound good to me!!!! I also forgot dootle bugs not sure how to spell. Remember catching lots of lizards...oh forgot mangos, guavas, persimmons, and sea grapes. Also, remember washing my feet before going to bed.....used to love to turn on the lights on grandpa's back porch before going to bed and watch the roaches scatter....but things have gone to pot since moving north....turned over things to shuffleboard folks who have burned their brain cells in the sun and can't tell how to vote.
93 posted on 02/14/2002 10:15:18 AM PST by LADYAK
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To: wimpycat
Biscuits and tomato gravy. Home canned/frozen vegetables, right outta the family garden. Homecoming - at churches and football stadiums. Homemade sausage with lots of sage. Vacation Bible School. Dogwoods that bloom at Easter. Miss Eudora Welty. William Faulkner. Affordable golf.
94 posted on 02/14/2002 10:16:11 AM PST by TontoKowalski
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To: Illbay
:-D

I'm with you on "that NASCAR thing."

95 posted on 02/14/2002 10:17:25 AM PST by sheltonmac
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To: kd5cts
I'm coming over!!!!! :) Yummmmmmmmmy.
96 posted on 02/14/2002 10:17:27 AM PST by LibertyGirl77
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To: sheltonmac
My South is home to the most beautiful women on the planet.

You can say that again... Southern women are beautiful.. Mississippi, Georgia, Tennessee, Alabama, hmmm...

97 posted on 02/14/2002 10:18:24 AM PST by TexRef
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To: sheltonmac
The US space program grew up right here in good ole Alabama. There are more high technology jobs per capita in North Alabama (particularly Madison County) than in any large northern city.
98 posted on 02/14/2002 10:20:07 AM PST by AUgrad
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To: Redbob
Holly Pond."

Not a Cullman County hillbilly.(just joshing). A big Alabama bump!

99 posted on 02/14/2002 10:24:09 AM PST by AUgrad
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To: wimpycat
In my South, strangers in oncoming cars wave "Hey" to each other.

Ain't that the truth! I remember, once, when I was stationed in South Carolina, I was having a terrible day and nothing would make it better. I was driving my car with the A/C out in the mild of August and mad as hell at the entire world. A young lady in her late teens was walking on the side of the road. As I passed her, she smiled and waved at me. I had to turn the car around and thank her. She made my day bearable and she didn't care that my and her skin color didn't match.

I like the South.

100 posted on 02/14/2002 10:25:21 AM PST by dpa5923
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