A Little Bit About the South
I was once asked two questions that on the surface seemed rather simple and straight forward. They were: What makes a Southerner a Southerner? And for that matter exactly where is the South?
I knew the gentleman asking- a nouveau Suthron - was expecting a cut and dry geographic response. But when it comes to defining an entire region and the people in that region, there is never anything that is 'cut and dry' so I looked at him and said, “Dear Lord, do you really want an answer?”
*Now as an aside, the invoking of anecdotal precursory phrases such as 'Dear Lord', 'Heavens', or ‘Good Lord Almighty’ is quite common among women who view themselves as Southern whether they were born and raised in the South or feel as though they have become Southern via some kind of geographic osmosis.*
And my friend replied, “Yes, of course.”
Now I am no expert on the subject nor do I claim to be; however, I was born and raised in the South so I decided I would give it a well-intentioned shot. The following is a fairly decent summation of what I told my friend...
“I suppose I could be technical and say that what is considered by most Americans to be 'the South' is (alphabetically speaking): Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia and West Virginia. Oklahoma squeaks in, too, but the upper part tends to get grouped with the Midwest.
And trying to say ‘the South is here’ or ‘it is there’ is like trying to catch smoke in your hand. If I'm being quite frank, the South cannot be defined using something as static as longitude and latitude because being in the South is as much a state of mind felt by people who live below the Mason-Dixon Line as it is a place.
‘The South’ I grew up in is anywhere that 'yes, ma'am' and 'no, sir' are used without question. It’s a place where real men open doors for ANY woman, regardless of age, color, or religious background. (Sure, there are still people here who are stuck in the preCivil Rights era where the definition of civility was more than a bit skewed - but please don't let a few rotten peaches spoil the whole bushel!)
‘The South’ is where any woman who is old enough to run a Sunday school class is called 'Miss' regardless if she is, was, or everhas been married. It’s also where you can find out about all the things going on in a town simply by reading church bulletins as they list everything from birth announcements to prayer requests to reminders about upcoming ice cream socials. And in the South, church members are not just parishioners; they are 'brother' and 'sister'.
As for churches, they can be found on just about every corner in the heart of any little town. Lutherans, Methodists, and Baptists, oh my! Why, I can almost guarantee that every Sunday the parking lots of those churches, as well as the parking areas of all the other religious denominations, are overflowing with good Christian families wishing to be filled with the Holy Spirit in the allotted 45 minute morning worship time frame.
Of course, being that the modern South is filled with millions of foward thinking men and women - it is a place where all sorts of religious beliefs are not simply 'tolerated' but 'welcomed'. As my father used to tell me when I was a child, a wise man of religion is the one who sees nuggets of wisdom in all the faiths of the world. His words are probably some of the wisest words I think I've ever pondered.
One major element of the Southern lifestyle is without a doubt... the Southern preacher. Yes, preaching can be a dauntining task for those who are the most faithful servants of the Good Lord. Because not only must they reach out using the Word of God to all the Glorious Shepherd's pious children on a weekly basis they must also be wary of a demon over which they have no control. And that demon is... the clock on the back wall.
Because the good reverends know that as the noon hour draws clower, the ability of their flock to receive the Word of God becomes overshadowed by their desire to eat lunch. Now I can speak from experience as I've attended many different denominations within thr Christian faith and I can say, it is a rare thing indeed for an established minister to go over the unspoken 10 minute grace period that starts shortly after both hands on the clock are praying straight up to the Lord, Himself.
But when it does happen... it’s never a pretty site.
I can only imagine the frustration a minister feels when he looks out and sees his parishioners getting antsy and hears their heavy sighs as well as the agitated rustling of those informative church bulletins when the minute hand sweeps past high noon. And with each tick of the clock, their restlessness grows so great that if a quick summation is not forthcoming...everything said prior to the benediction will have all been for naught. And the pastors who’ve been around for a while know tat the most effective sermons -- the ones that really drive home the message -- are short, sweet, and to the point.
And speaking of driving... no Southern minister in their right mind ever, and I do mean NEVER EVER, plan a ‘knock out sermon’ for the following dates: Memorial Day, Labor Day or the Sunday closest to the 4th of July and not just because they are 3-day weekends.
Heavens, no! Those are prime NASCAR (National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing) weekends and no one... not even the Big Guy in the Sky can come between a devoted NASCAR fan and an important race event.
I say no one because NASCAR is practically a religion in and of itself. (I, however, do not follow any of the tenets of the NASCAR faith)
Luckily, most NASCAR religious events are held on the weekends after the weekly 'gathering at a house of worship' meeting but there are some races that require special sacraments prior to the actual event. (In the world of non-NASCAR aficionados it’s tailgating - even if it’s done from the comfort of a person’s living room).
Of course, the gurus of NASCAR would have quite a challenge on their hands if they dared to schedule any races on a Wednesday because as a general rule of thumb, on any given Wednesday evening, all the good Christians can be found at their preferred ecclesiastical establishment for Bible study and/or youth group. Yes, you'd be hard pressed to find a small town in the South where ANY event (school play, sport, town council meeting, etc.) is scheduled on a Wednesday evening.
Unless it's a week-long tent revival held outside beneath a thin canopy set out in the blistering sun among the gnats and other no see-ums. Ah, yes, those good old fashioned summer time revivals... we really do still have those down South and they are always in the hottest part of the season, too.
Call me silly, but I've always believed a tent revival is held in the summer specifically to coincide with all the Hellfire and damnation sermons that are given because the ambient heat must surely help to get the message through. And I swanny-Johnny*, those sermons are the ones no one would dare consider complaining about if it took longer than the typical 30-minute 'you'll to go Hell if you don't follow this path' sermon. (Swannying-Johnny is a polite way to say 'I swear to God' only saying 'I swear to God' is swearing which is bad - oh, gracious, I think I'm bound for Hell)
Why, to glance at your watch might very well bring down a shower of fire and brimstone right onto your lap. And with all that evangelical hair in such close quarters you definitely don’t want anything flammable nearby because you might set the place ablaze! (Confused? Just imagine a hair-helmet atop a reverend's head. A coif like that needs a lot of hairspray to keep it in place which is highly flammable!)
But enough of Southern religion because I have no doubt that I could write a ten volume set on the topic and still not do it justice! Besides, I’d much rather move on and discuss the personal side of the South... the Southern mindset.
To be a true Southerner... you have to be born here. If you weren't born here, the real ones will always eye you with a bit of suspicion. Which is why it's important to temember down South a woman can say more in an instant with her smile than could ever be uttered; and, an entire conversation can be spoken by a man with a simple nod of his head. Oh, you’ll be welcomed... after all, hospitality is a Southern trademark but don’t expect to be immediately accepted especially if you don’t sound like one of us.
Because the voice is such an important part of who you are down here. Many is the time I’ve heard people laugh as they talk about how Southerners speak with over exaggerated diphthongs (gliding together vowels like in the words you + all = y'all). Or they clip endings to words (so that the word doing becomes duin). And sometimes Southerners will create wholly new words (ex. what are = whuter). Put it all together and you get ‘What are you all doing?’ which becomes ‘Whuter ya’ll duin?’ in my neck of the woods.
However, it must be noted that there isn’t really a singular Southern accent rather it’s an amalgamation of all the various dialects heard throughout the region. A person raised in Louisiana sounds completely different than someone raised in Virginia. And to hear a person from Murphy, NC, the farthest point to the west in the state read the Gettysburg Address aloud and then to hear that same speech read by someone from Manteo, the farthest point east in NC is like night and day even though there are only about 500 miles separating them.
Though sadly it seems the thicker the ‘accent’... the more stupid a person is considered, which is really a shame, because it isn't at all true. But words do speak volumes and if you don't know all the fancy 'educated' terms or you blend a few too many vowels or you clip an abundance of those words you might as well be planting watermelon seeds.
To be quite honest if one were to analyze the vocal patterns of someone raised in the South regardless of where in the South in may be, one would find that the Southern speech pattern is really quite melodic with a soft flowing relaxed sort of lilt. Maybe it’s that way because people in the South follow the patientia est virtus credo when it comes to life. After all there is no need to zip through our lives or our words as if time is always running short.
Of course, life in the South is not all mint juleps, magnolias, and Krispy Kreme Donuts. (And if you don't know what Krispy Kreme Donuts are, I'm teribly sorry! Because they are probably the sweetest, most fattening donuts in the entire world. Lordy, when they are served warm, it’s like biting into a little bit of Heaven.) There are problems here just as there are problems anywhere. But unlike all those other places where life whizzes past so quickly it’s hard to catch your breath, down South we know how to stop and see the forest for the trees.
Yes, this is the home of moonshine, shotguns, and pig-pickins'. But it's also the land of debutante balls, cotillions, and military academies. And we're not stupid. Not by a long shot.
Many Presidents hail from the South; George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, James Monroe, Dwight D. Eisenhower, and Lyndon Baines Johnson just to name a few. And there are also a few other smart and famous Southern individuals like: Edward R. Murrow, William Sydney Porter (better known as O. Henry), Dizzy Gillespie, Ray Charles, Margaret Mitchel, Zelda Fitzgerald, Helen Keller, Harper Lee, and Jimmy Buffet (hey, you've got to give it up to the man who gave the world one of the best summertime songs ever with 'Margaritaville').
There's also Fannie Flagg (she made Fried Green Tomatoes more than just an interesting edible), Tennessee Williams, Admiral David Farragut, Benjamin Banneker, Harriet Tubman, Frederick Douglass, Upton Sinclair, and Frank Zappa (Yeah, yeah... he was a wigged out musician... but he was also one Hell of a composer and innovator!)
I could go on... there are so many more amazingly smart and gifted people from the South. But, my mother taught me to never harp over things which are obvious."
And with that I looked at my friend and asked, "Shall I go on?"
After which my friend smiled and said, “No, need. I think I’m starting to understand.”
So, now you know what I told my friend. For those of you who are Southern, I hope this lifted your spirits and made you proud to be who you are. And for those of you who aren’t Southern or who might have forgotten what it really means, it’s my hope that you will sit back and examine the world you live in if only for a minute.
The Dumb-Ass Question Zone
I remember a time when was in a store and watched a young married man flounder hopelessly after he questioned the reason as to why his equally young wife needed to purchase various hair care products which to him were nothing more than redundant beauty supplies that were unnecessary and entirely too high priced.
The young woman, who I learned was named Danielle, had placed a myriad of cosmetics and hair care accessories on the counter and smiled broadly as she reached into her extremely large purse to, I assume, retrieve her frequent customer discount card or perhaps her credit card while her husband stood there looking exasperated.
Granted, the obvious newlywedded man tried to not look frustrated while he watched the individual prices pop up on the monitor as the attendant zapped each little barcode. Only he became more aggitated with each ‘boop’ sound that was made by the machine. Then he crossed his arms and let out a heavy sigh as he said, “Good grief, Danielle. What’s all this stuff for? Conditioner? Leave-in conditioner? Don’t those do the same thing?”
Danielle turned to him and with a genuine look of shock on her face said, “No, Chris, they do not do the same thing. This...” — she picked up the bottle of rinse out hair conditioner that was about $11 and said, “is what I put on after I wash my hair so it keeps its color. And this...” – she pointed to the spray-on, leave-in conditioner that rang up as $8.99, “is what I use when I blow dry my hair so it won’t dry out.”
Chris shook his head as he tried to process the information he’d been given but apparently her words became nothing more than a jumble of gobble-dee-gook to his excessively male ears because he simply could not fathom the notion that one would need two different kinds of conditioners for the same head of hair. He cocked his head to the side and said, “You need a conditioner to use on your hair when you blow dry it so you won’t blow it dry? That makes absolutely no sense, Danielle.”
Whereupon Danielle rolled her eyes, sighed deeply, and turned to face the attendant who announced the total price of their purchase to be:“$57.43.”
When Chris heard the price for all of Danielle’s hair accessories and various other cosmetic type products, his eyes grew large as he inhaled so deeply the vacuum he created probably could have sucked in a small planet.
But Danielle said nothing to him. Instead she rolled her eyes again as she started to rummage once more through her excessively large handbag for her wallet. After about 30 seconds of intense hunting she looked at the woman behind the register and smiled as she said, “Oops, I think I left my wallet in my other purse.”
The employee grinned and said, “Sugar, I do that all the time.”
Danielle turned to her husband and asked, “Chris, baby, can you get this?”
And this was the moment when I knew Chris was very new to the whole ‘husband’ thing because he replied, “Sonuvagun, why did you change pocketbooks again? I don’t see why you keep doing that. No one needs that many pocketbooks.” Then he swiped his credit card through the machine and added, “You know, you always leave stuff out when you change purses. Maybe you oughta carry a big ol’ duffle bag so you can have them with you all the time. Then you can whip out whichever one strikes your fancy.”
It did not take Chris long to realize that his smart-alecky remark was not the right thing to say to Danielle because she snatched up the bag of beauty supplies and marched herself to the automatic doors without so much as sneaking one look at him. Chris’s shoulders drooped when he figured out that he’d dared to question that which makes a woman feel ‘womanly’ and thus had gone where no man should ever go...
~The Dumb-Ass Question Zone~
I had to turn to around to keep from laughing at what had unfolded before me. But the elderly couple behind me thought it was a hoot to see the whole thing take place and laughed out loud. I can only imagine it’s because it reminded them of a moment taken from their lives long ago.
Driving back to my house, I found myself giggling at the memory of that look on Chris’s face because it was one I’d seen my own husband wear many times after we’d first gotten married. And as I made my way down the long winding road to my humble abode, I took a sip from the bottled water I’d purchased and thought of all the little things that men find themselves pondering when it comes to their wives, girlfriends, sisters and mothers. And I realized there are so many things in the Dumb-Ass Question Zone, that if I was to try and mention them all I’d never finish!
So, I narrowed it down to 9 truths about women that men typically do not know until they are well beyond the age when knowing would be to their advantage. And they are...
9. A pocketbook, handbag, or purse (choose your favorite descriptive name) is an extension of a woman’s personality. Some days she might choose a sleek, smart looking little purse while other days she may opt for an oversized catch all. And a man must not try to consider why a woman suddenly feels the need to switch out this purse for that one or to purchase a new one altogether... to do so could very well cause his head to explode;
8. Shoes need not be functional or practical and as far as a limit on the amount of shoes a woman may have... the sky is the limit. No, there is no real need for stilettos just as there is no need for a woman to have 4 pair of the same shoes in different colors other than the fact that women, like men, are often required to wear certain kinds of footwear for their jobs and having the ability to literally step out of those shoes and into something totally different can be emotionally uplifting for a woman;
7. One more shoe tidbit... a woman can purchase a pair of shoes regardless of whether or not she has something with which the shoes can be paired. This particular statement points out one of the inherent differences between the psyche of men and women. Men purchase shoes as well as most other items in response to an immediate need whereas women will purchase those same items at any given time because they do so with an eye for the future. So good gentlemen, never question a woman's shoes;
6. As a woman prepares for a night out on the town it is perfectly fine for her to say, “Excuse me, I need to go put on my face” before stepping out. But for a man to ask, “Do you need to put on your face?” is totally unacceptable. This implies that the woman needs to do something to make herself look better as if she looks horrid without cosmetic assistance whereas when a woman says it she is implying, ‘I care enough about us that I want everyone to see what a handsome couple we are.’;
5. The question ‘does this make me look fat?’ or any derivation thereof is not a trick question because there is only one answer. You see, if a woman is asking - it means she either already thinks it isn't a good look or she thinks it looks hotter than Hell. And either way the only response should be, 'Honey, you look beautiful.' Of course, if woman was to ask that same question to one of her besties, her friend would not hesitate to tell her if something was flattering or not. Granted there are many women who need to learn the art of tact when they share this information but in the long run we are so appreciative to know that we did not step out in public wearing something which makes us like a pillow cinched in the middle with a skinny belt that we are usually willing to overlook the sandpaper way in which we’ve been told;
4. If a woman asks, ‘How does it taste?’ after slaving away preparing a new dish it would behoove a man to answer honestly. Otherwise he may end up eating that same dish again and again which can only lead to a future of disharmonious dinnertimes and a genuine fear of any new food items that might make their way out of the kitchen and onto his plate. But again, the need for tact when responding to this question is a must;
3. And now a note for men about women's hair. It is essential that men are always on the lookout for any subtle changes in a woman’s tresses and that they remark positively about those changes no matter what even if there has been no ‘change’ at all because asking ‘Honey, did you do something to your hair? It looks nice.’ with a smile on one’s face is like giving woman an unexpected happygram. (Just be careful not to overdo it);
2. Another note about hair. When it is crystal clear that a woman has had something done to her hair and she wants to know how it looks... she is either very pleased with her new coif and simply wants to hear how great she looks OR she hates it. Now a man must be very careful when walking this particular tightrope. Because if he knows beyond a shadow of a doubt that she’s just had her hair colored, cut, permed or highlighted and it is evident that the effect isn’t quite what she or anyone else expected, he should... without a doubt... lie.
Lie his ass off!
Because for a woman, dealing with a botched hairdo is not as simple as putting on a jacket to help slim a wide waist or tossing in a bit of pepper to jazz up a not so tasty pot of stew. So --- lie, lie, lie, lie, lie; and,
1. Gentlemen, what all this boils down to is that a grown woman is not a girl. She is an altogether unique form of being with often confusing behaviors and the moment a man accepts the fact that he will always be confused whenever he's around a woman is the instant his life will become so much easier.
Grilled Water w/a Side of Lard...To Go!
I grew up in Concord, North Carolina, which, when I was young, was a relatively small town where a vast majority of the population worked either directly at or, in some round about sort of way, for the local textile mill in neighboring Kannapolis. The mill was established back in 1888 by William Cannon and employed generations of families who worked their entire adult lives amid the massive machinery which produced every kind of textile product imaginable.
The mill-folk made good honest money working there and the mill, which was at the heart of pretty much everything, ran practically 24 hours a day, 6 days a week...but never on Sundays. Because in my hometown where there were churches scattered all across the countryside, going to church was not just a reflection of one’s faith. It was also one of the only times during the week when the mill-folk could not only visit with the rest of the town’s population but where mill managers and floor workers could mingle amongst one another without having to deal with people gossiping over ‘who was talking to whom’.
Yes, you’d be hard pressed to find anyone who was not either in church on Sunday, or for a handful of Sunday’s out of the year, making their way to the next closest religious venue...the Charlotte (even though it’s actually in Concord) Motor Speedway (now known as the Lowe’s Motor Speedway) to enjoy the thrill and excitement of NASCAR, the motor sport born in the South in the mid 1950s, which has only recently started to be viewed by people in other regions as a bona fide sport. Though where I’m from, it’s more than just a ‘sport’; the high octane fueled races are an all out passion.
Racing was such a huge part of my hometown that it seemed as if it had been woven into the fabric of the community just like a pattern is woven into one of the towels made at the mill. Why I remember being a little girl and not going to church on race day...only it wasn’t because we were headed to the track to see the races nor were we going to watch them on television. No. It was because other than the interstate, there were essentially only two roads that led to the speedway and my church was located on one of them.
Yes, my church, Poplar Tent Presbyterian—established 1754— was on a road that for about 350 days each year was lightly traveled—so lightly in fact that they didn’t put up any traffic lights until the late 1980s. But on race days and weekends, that narrow two lane road would become so congested with fans making their way to the track to see one of the Winston Cup series races that the state highway patrol had to come out and direct traffic which made getting to church services (on time) next impossible. So, many families like mine simply chose to forego the hassle of dealing with the Sunday morning, beer buzzed, wannabe NASCAR drivers who would speed down the various narrow back roads that led to my house of worship as they tossed their empties and flicked their Winston cigarette butts out of their car windows along the way like some sort of offering to the gods of racing figuring that God would spot us one or two freebies since we’d so faithfully attended services on 50 out of 52 Sundays during the year.
But other than Sundays (and the occasional Saturday when preliminary races were run) one could find a majority of the adult population busy at work in one of the giant buildings where fine linens were produced by the hundreds of thousands. And when the whistle would sound for their lunch breaks the employees would file out of the buildings in quick time to grab a bite to eat, chat with friends and inhale as many cigarettes as humanly possible during their 30 minute break. Thankfully there were several little eateries close by where one could do all three of those things at the same time and make it back to the mill in time to have a few hurried final drags on a cigarette before returning to work.
One such place was the ‘What-A-Burger’ (not to be confused with the Whataburger® fast food chain based in Texas) where you could place your order and in about five minutes, get a thick, fresh cooked cheeseburger topped with locally grown lettuce, tomatoes, and onions and finished off with 3 thin, tasty Mt. Olive dilled pickle chips. And no self-respecting person would dare eat such a tasty burger without a large helping of French fries or quite possibly some thick cut Vidalia onion rings deep fried in piping hot, seasoned beef tallow and sprinkled with enough salt to raise the blood pressure of a resident of the county morgue.
And what better way to wash it all down than with an ice cold Pepsi sweetened with real cane sugar or maybe a Cheerwine (a super bubbly cherry flavored soda pop that has been bottled in Salisbury, North Carolina, a town about 15 miles north of my hometown, since 1917)? Or if you felt like going all out, you could enjoy a real cherry-lemon Sun-Drop (another hometown favorite also bottled locally which you’d be hard pressed to find anywhere outside of the southeast unless you happen to be in the Minnesota region where it originally was and still is produced- odd, yes).
(Thankfully we’ve all learned a lot about how terribly bad those terrifically good tasting things were for us not to mention the negative health implications that are associated with smoking.)
I can still I remember how I could smell the aroma of beef sizzling on the grill as my parents would pull into the What-A-Burger parking lot. Of course, I also I remember how disillusioned I felt when I was about 10 years old after I figured out that its name was “What” “A” "Burger" and not Whudder-Burger (which sounded an awful lot like how water was pronounced where I was from). Yes, I honestly thought that the reason they were such juicy hamburgers was because they were made with some sort of magical beefy flavored water that formed a burger when poured on the grill much the way that a golden pancake forms when batter is poured onto a hot griddle. But even though they weren’t made with water that came from where cows would go skinny dipping, the burgers at What-A-Burger were, hands down, some of the best burgers I’d ever eaten even if I did have to enjoy them in a haze of cigarette and burger smoke.
I moved away from my hometown many years ago and in that time so much has happened to the place I used to call home. The mill eventually closed when all the work was outsourced to China and other countries where taxes are lower and workers are willing to labor for less than they are worth, displacing 1000s of workers who knew nothing but millwork.
But it’s not all that bad...the What-A-Burger is still there and is still serving hot juicy burgers and onion rings (even though the beef often comes from hormone enriched cows and the fried goods are now fried in 100% monounsaturated vegetable oil and the salt is added by patrons). One can also still find Cheerwine and Sundrop in grocery stores and on restaurant menus (even though they are now sweetened with high fructose corn syrup instead of cane sugar because it’s cheaper). And NASCAR is doing better than ever and has expanded to include a larger viewing demographic (and it’s done so without the backing of the cigarette corporations).
Yes, I am much older than 10 now and in the years since my beefy-epiphany my hometown has changed from a sleepy little mill town surrounded by pastoral farm land into a sprawling city with multilane highways, a myriad of fast food restaurants, and a high-tech research facility that is being built where the old mill stood for over one hundred years. Isn’t progress amazing?
You Know We Don't Say That Word!
A few years ago, I'd received an injection of cortisone beneath my right kneecap to help relieve pain in the knee where I'd had surgery about 20 years before. Incidentally, I'm not a super-athlete or anything...I'm just a tad bit klutzy. My father used to call it being a 'flibberty-jibbert' because I was always going, going, going. Until one day, when I was in college, being somewhat athletic and riding my bike up a rather steep hill. My gear slipped and the result was me pushing through the revolution so I could get off the bike safely, lest I fall into the road. That one action totally blew out my knee which led to pain, swelling, and eventual surgery.
Over the years, I've slowed down a little bit but it's quite difficult to give up one's flibberty-jibberting ways and so I've banged and broken my toes, closed the trunk of my own car on my head, and run up and down stairs...while wearing heels entirely too high. It was a given that eventually all my twists, bruises, strains, and sprains would catch up to me. And it did. So, I went to an orthopedist who decided the best fix for me was cortisone. He told me 'this will hurt a bit and you'll feel a bit stiff tomorrow. But in a couple of days you'll feel much better'.
I learned very quickly that what he was really saying was, 'you're going to want to rip out my eyeballs as I'm giving you this shot and in about six hours, you're going to consider hiring a hitman to blow out my brains because your knee is going to feel so badly. Oh, and you'll feel worse tomorrow. But I'm not lying about feeling better in few days.'
Rambling aside, after the shot and after I'd cursed and cried, I spend a day limping around like I was doing method research to play the role of Quasimodo in a low budget community theatre production. What’s more the after effects of the powerful steroid not only made me sick to my stomach but I found myself having to deal with powerful hot flashes. And whenever I don’t feel well I like to nibble on my favorite comfort food…chicken and dumplings.
Unfortunately when I opened up my cupboard to pull down the spices I needed for the classic Southern dish, I found that I was lacking a few of them. Now I suppose I could have made the stuff without all the ‘special ingredients’, but where I come from, one does not bastardize a treasured recipe for convenience sake. So I decided I would make my way to the grocery store even though I felt like sin on a Wednesday.
*Sin on a Wednesday is an old Southern saying because there was a time when people would all go to church on Wednesday for Bible study. And if you ‘sinned on a Wednesday’ well, it was about as bad as ‘sinning on a Sunday’. (Apparently God, the Father Almighty has a day planner wherein He keeps close track of who’s been sinning and on what day.)
I got in my car hoping to make the trip short, sweet and wholly uneventful. But as I was driving at the posted 45MPH (because the road I was on is one of the sheriff department’s favorite places to catch speeders) I happened to glance in my rearview mirror and saw a huge red Hummer coming up fast behind me with a female driver who was chatting away on her cell phone as she smoked a cigarette and before I knew it, the front grill of her Hummer was so close to my rear bumper that I thought we might need to get married!
Needless to say, I figured she would try to pass me as soon as we got to a point in road where there was a dashed line. But apparently in her world a double solid line means ‘sure go ahead risk your life and the lives of others so you can shave a couple of seconds off your trip’ because just after passing the main spot where deputy sheriffs like to hang out, she floored her brick on wheels and whipped into the other lane to pass me. I swear, I was so startled by her actions the hair on my arms stood up as she passed me. And when I noticed there was a car coming in the other direction, I hit my brakes so she could zip back over into the correct lane.
Now I utterly loathe it when people do things like what she had done and since I already wasn’t feeling too well, my inner Southern bitch sprang forth from the deep recesses of my light genteel, polite psyche allowing me to tap into my dark-trailer park princess side. I shouted out a few choice words about the dangerous driver followed by an out loud exclamation of, “Dear Lord, why don’t people like her get caught?!”
Then…out of the blue, she hit her brakes because she spotted one of our faithful civil servants at a stop sign ahead. I couldn’t help but laugh. And I nearly cried with laughter when he pulled out into our lane, directly in front of her. Yes, I'll admit, I snorted with joy. As I followed behind the giant vehicle that was now forced to obey the speed limit, I noticed that there were stick figure decals of a mom, dad, 2 boys, 1 girl, a dog, a cat and 2 horses plastered to the back window.
Personally I see those little stickers as a beacon to perverts. Sort of like… ‘Oh, look Bob! There you go – a house with 2 boys and a girl. Nice. Very, very nice. I’ll just follow them and see where we wind up.’ (I’d love to know how many people who just read that went ‘Oh. My. God! I have to get that off my car NOW!’
However, the sweet little ‘stick figure family’ snapshot wasn’t nearly as interesting as the set of ‘steel balls’ that were hanging from the tow hitch on the rear of her Hummer as if the thing was a massive diesel powered steed looking for a dark parking lot and a lonely Ford Mustang to hump. What’s more, the license tag was a vanity plate that read, ‘22MCH4U’. It took me a few seconds to figure out what the alphanumeric code meant but eventually it dawned on me…Too too much for you…good grief.
Not only did I have a steel testicle toting SUV in front of me, but the owners of said vehicle felt it important to announce to the world that they thought they were better than everyone else. And I abhor conceited people so my inner Southern bitch once again emerged and my typically genteel disposition was cast aside as I rolled my eyes and muttered things that would have made my grandmother roll over in her grave…thank the Lord she was cremated.
Yes, knowing that the driver had to obey the now 35MPH speed limit because she was following the deputy made me giggle. But her law abiding ways didn’t last long because he turned down a crossroad and the Hell bent for leather Hummer driver took off.
Unfortunately, her speed demon ways nearly caused her to take out one of the cadets attending the summer session at Oak Ridge Military Academy, an historic military academy, in the town right next to mine. The fellow was about two steps away from entering into the pedestrian crossing but thankfully he stopped just in time to keep from getting squashed like a bug wearing an upper level cadet’s uniform. I remember gasping loudly as the giant vehicle rocked back and forth in place when its antilock brakes engaged. And I’m not sure but as I passed the cadet a few seconds later he wore a shocked expression on his face...almost as if he’d been scolded by the driver for getting in her way.
I couldn't wait to get away from this obnoxious woman. And wouldn’t you know it, the gargantuan gas guzzler turned into the parking lot of the grocery store where I was headed and then proceeded to whip her monstrous machine into two parking spaces. Oh, how I despise it when people are so rude and inconsiderate! But I took a deep breath and figured I was being overly sensitive because I felt crappy.
Once I made it inside the store, I spied the driver with her cell phone still stuck to her ear. Her three children. the same ones depicted in stick-figure form on her back window, wandered nearby until the teenage daughter, who looked like she’d rather have her nails ripped out than to be at the store with her mother and siblings, wandered off leaving the bleach-bottle-blonde mom and her two surgically enhanced breasts (I’ll bet you thought I was going to say her sons…you thought wrong! Though to be honest her WAY-too-perfect-knockers were probably like children to her) to deal with her youngest children – the two boys as noted on the back window and who were far from cherubic angels that liked to touch everything.
I decided to hold my tongue when I saw them put their hands on several plums and then on some apples because I really didn’t feel like using the commanding ‘teacher voice’ I’d honed over twelve years of teaching so I ignored them, got a shopping basket and dashed…no, limped with great zeal to the aisle I needed. Once I’d grabbed my spices I decided I’d get some fresh chicken so I wouldn’t have to defrost any. So I backtracked to the meat department where I saw Hummer mom (phone still affixed to her ear) and her sons. Then I heard the smaller of the two boys yell out, “MAMA, FRANKIE CALLED ME A STUPID TERD-HEAD!! To wit mama scolded loudly (while her phone was still stuck to her ear), “Frankie you know we don’t say that word! Tell Jessie you’re sorry right now!”
*Yes, that’s right – the boys were named Frank and Jessie. What’s more, I have a sneaky suspicion their last name is James which would mean their names are Frank and Jessie James, as in the notorious Wild West outlaws, because their mother strikes me as being married to a man who’d think giving his boys bad ass outlaw monikers would be funny as hell.*
Then Jessie yelled out, “YEAH, FRANKIE, I AIN’T STUPID!!” (Apparently stupid is a ‘no no’ word but terd-head is perfectly fine.)
I grabbed my chicken and left the area to pick up a few more things, hoping that was the last I’d seen of them. But then again the way things had been going in regards to this family I should have known there was more in store because about five minutes later, after gathering some odds and ends, I remembered I needed to get some frozen broccoli so I hobbled over to frozen veggie land only to catch site of Frank and Jessie putting their mouths up against the frosty glass doors and blowing what Jessie called ‘face farts’ onto them then laughing like they’d done something absolutely awesome.
A few seconds later, I heard their mother (and YES, the phone was still up to her ear) snap at her boys, “I done told you two to stop that!” (What terrible luck! It seems I missed the first few ‘face farts’.)
That’s when the daughter shuffled over to her mother and tossed a pint of Dryer’s Dibs ice cream into the cart. Hummer mother looked at her daughter as she took the phone away from her ear while she asked in a perturbed tone, “Why’d you get them? You know your daddy says them things look like baby horse terds.”
The boys snorted with laughter and started sing-songing, ‘Baby horse terds, horse terds!)
(Oh my Good Lord in Heaven! What is it with the terd-talk?!)
Whereupon the daughter whined in her very best ‘God, I hate my life’ voice said, “Cause I like ‘em. Duhhhh”. After which she smacked Frankie on the head while adding, “Shut up, brat!”
And then there was a chorus of angry sounding country-hick-speak coming from Hummer mother and her children and all I wanted to do was to get out of that store and get home so I could feel miserable in peace. So, I snatched a bag of broccoli out of the freezer. I made my way to the checkout counter and as Patty the clerk slowly rang up my items, all I could think was, Oh sweet Jesus in a manger! Put some damn lead in, Patty…you’re in NASCAR country for God’s Sake!
Oh, that’s right...I invoked two of the three ‘I cannot believe this Holy Trinity’ If I’d have pulled out the third one – ‘Lord, have Mercy!’ I think the Heavens would’ve opened up and a shower of Dryer’s baby horse terd Dibs might’ve fallen on me)
Eventually, all my items were tallied, I swiped my AMEX card and I left.
I often wonder what Hummer mama and her off-spring are up to these days? Face-farting? Terd-chanting? I suppose I'll never know but at least I can go to my grave knowing that 'stupid' is bad while references to anal expulsions is perfectly acceptable among the steel-balled, giant SUV crowd. And what a better woman I am today for having been so enlightened!
*Turd or terd - does it matter? Though turd is the 'proper' way to spell the slang term which is a derivation the Old English spelling of tord which actually had its roots the Norse language where it was tord-yfill; terd-is a blending of the words tord and herd as 'terd' is what herders/farmers sometimes refer to manure as.*
So, I Stapled My Thumbs Together
It was a sunny Sunday morning back in the summer of ’78 and my family and I were all dressed in our summery Sunday finest and had piled into our giant green Ford land yacht that I like to refer to fondly as the USS Williams all so we could make the five mile trip to our church. I remember I had on my sandals and a pretty little sundress with polka dots on it. My brother and sister climbed into the backseat and I went to sit in my spot in the front only there was a pile of papers and stapler where I usually sat.
***
But wait…before I go any farther…let me bend your ear and tell you about how a typical trip to church went for the Williams clan. Now this was long before the notion of using seatbelts was popular. Cars did have them, only back then they weren’t much more than a lap belt that looked an awful lot like a modern day airplane seatbelt. Our ‘safety’ lap belts usually wound up getting squished down between the cushions to keep them out of the way. Needless to say, I didn’t wear a seatbelt as a kid.
Likewise, it was also a couple of decades before any sort of laws requiring children under 60 pounds to be secured in a car or booster seat in the backseat of a vehicle for their safety. So guess where I sat the vast majority of the time? That’s right…my spot was in the front seat between my mama and daddy. (You know, it’s amazing as many people from the years before all those nifty safety gadgets and laws survived to adulthood)
As I said, my spot was in the front seat…unless my parents grew tired of listening to my siblings bickering from the backseat. When that happened my parents would make me sit between them. I think they thought I would somehow be able to stop their teenage tendency to poke one another in the leg or the arm like it was an Olympic sport and I was the referee.
Only I was very tiny at 8…I’m talking I was really teeny tiny so putting me in the backseat never really worked out too well because my brother and sister would just start smacking each other on the shoulder or the back of the head. And then my parents would get mad because somehow it always wound up that I would eventually be on the receiving end of a poke/slap that didn’t meet its intended mark. Then I’d start crying and my mother, who could whip her head around at like a whirlwind, would ‘assume the angry mother look’ while my father simultaneously grabbed the rearview mirror and did his famous big-eyed ‘I am watching you’ stare.
Typically ‘the double parental stare down’ worked to get my siblings cease and desist their behavior…at least for a couple of minutes. But then one of them would say something stupid like, “I didn’t start it.” To wit my mother would reply, “I don’t care who started it but I promise you I will go back that and finish it so you two had best keep your mouths shut and your hands to yourself.” Lucky for them my mama never had to ‘finish it’ because it was usually around that time when we’d pull into the church parking lot.
*I know I said this was a tale of stapled thumbs and it is, I promise. But first, let me describe a typical Sunday at our church.*
Once we arrived and parked beneath one of the giant oak trees, we’d make our way out of our land yacht and proceed into the church so we could be filled with the Holy Spirit. Although when you’re 8 years old, it’s pretty hard to be motivated by anything that requires a lengthy amount of time wherein one has to not only remain seated but also must be quiet, too. Yes, that is quite difficult indeed. For me, it was gadzoodles harder than it was for most kids because I was a talker…always have been…always will be (as I’m sure you can probably tell). And considering I was diagnosed as an adult with ADHD it puts my fidgetiness in a whole new light.
Now just as there was a seating arrangement in our car, the Williams family also had a particular way we sat in our pews. We always tried to sit in the same set of pews. They were right in the middle where these long support columns came down and divided the pew in half.
That way my Mama could sit on the end of the pew closest to the aisle. My sister sat beside her. My Daddy sat beside her. I sat beside my Daddy. And my brother, well he got to sit next to the column. That way there was a good buffer zone between my brother and sister (Daddy and myself) and if anyone wanted to get up during the service he or she had better have had a handwritten note from Jesus himself because there was no way my Mama was about to let either one of my two siblings go wandering around the church unattended.
I must say I loved sitting beside my father. Whenever we’d open up our Bibles to read the congregational selection, he’d whisper what the passage was about to me in terms I could understand because I never quite understood the way our minister would try to explain it. Then we’d sing some hymns.
To me, singing hymns was the best part of our services because my Daddy would let me stand on the pew and share his hymnal with him. The funny thing is, I don’t think my father ever actually looked at the words to any of the hundreds of songs in that book…and yet, he seemed to know the tune and words (all the words to every verse) like he’d written them himself. He had a smooth baritone voice and sometimes, when I was tired, he’d hold me instead of the hymnal and I’d lay my head on his chest and listen to the way his voice resonated in my ears.
The one song my father could never sing at church…not because he didn’t know it…he did…was ‘Amazing Grace’. It always got him choked up. I didn’t understand why at the time but later, when I was old enough to put things together, it dawned on me that when I was 8 years old, my father was going through cancer treatment and I think the words moved him in a way a child simply could not understand.
Once we’d sung a few hymns, our pastor would start in on one of his ‘reach deep into your soul and shake some sense into ya’ sort of sermons he liked to use at least once a month and that was when my Daddy and I would play games like tic-tac-toe, dots, and hangman on our church bulletins or on the offering envelopes that were in the little holders on the backs of the pews with the always freshly sharpened pencils that reminded me of when we’d go play putt-putt at the beach.
But one can only play so many rounds of tic-tac-toe before it gets a bit boring and drawing out all the little dots just to play the game took a good deal of time. Likewise, one can only come up with so many simple phrases for hangman before the church bulletin wound up looking like scratching post for wayward pencils.
*If you’ve made it this far in the story, I’m sure you’re starting to get antsy wondering when the stapled thumbs are going to be mentioned. And it’s coming…I swear.*
But first let me say that there were lots of times when my father and I would also play ‘thumb war’. (See, there are the thumbs! And soon all will be revealed.) Surely you’ve played the game before. You clasp your hands like you’re going to shake and then you say “One, two, three, four…I declare thumb war” after which you hold up your thumbs and try to catch and hold down your opponent’s thumb for 5 seconds.
Only since we were in church we had to play it very quietly and I couldn’t stand up or get too wiggly. That’s what made it so much fun for me because it was such a challenge. Oddly enough, my Daddy had these long thumbs but it seemed like I won just enough times to not get frustrated that I wasn’t winning all the time. Smart man, that Daddy of mine.
***
Finally…the heart of this little yarn
Now on this particular Sunday back in ’78 as I mentioned at the beginning of the story, I climbed into the car and found some papers and a stapler where I had to sit. I put the papers on my dotted sundress covered lap and placed the stapler on top of the papers. So far…so good. But then, about half way into our usual Sunday trip to church as my mother was telling my brother and sister to ‘knock it off’ and my father tuned the radio knob to a local station that played old time gospel music on Sunday from 6AM to 3PM, I picked up the stapler and stared at it.
Then I squished it together a couple of times and watched as the bent staples came flying out of the mouth of the device. But then, for some reason, they stopped coming out and I wondered why. (Maybe it was empty. I opened up the top and saw there were plenty of staples inside the thing. Nope not empty!) I closed it back again and tried squishing the stapler together once more to see if that would release the jam. It didn’t.
I was not about to be bested by a silly stapler after all, I was 8 years old. So I looked really closely at the mouth of the device and saw that the staples had gotten jammed up inside of the thing. Then I proceeded to tug out about 7 squished staples that gotten stuck. (Hey, I was in the Gifted and Talented program) Once it was cleared, I squeezed the thing together again and it was working again. Victory!
But then I’m not sure what motivated me to do the next thing because as soon as I did it, I instantly realized that perhaps it was not one of my wiser 8 year old decisions. You see, for some reason, I’d stuck both my thumbs beneath the stapler head and started playing with it as if it had ‘eaten’ my thumbs. I remember having a Wonder Woman moment and imagining that the stapler was some sort of dastardly trap I had to work my way out of or else the world was going to explode or something equally horrible. So then I started to fight with the stapler using my Wonder Woman powers. I held it in my hands with my thumbs stuck beneath the ‘mouth’ as I fought it and then…for some really stupid reason…I squeezed the stapler---HARD. (Needless to say, it was not one of my more ‘Gifted OR Talented’ moments)
If I think about it, I can still feel the blast of pain as it shot through my thumbs and made its way from my thumbs to my hands then to my mouth because in an instant I let out a blood curdling scream. My father slammed on the brakes…which wasn’t a good thing for me. Why?
Because I inadvertently squeezed the stapler back down on my thumbs as my mother did that thing with her arm where she whips it out at lightning speed and threw me back against the seat to keep from going forward into the dashboard. My brother and sister slammed into the front seat and started yelling at one another right away about who touched whom first in the quick brake melee. And there I was still screaming.
My parents were frantic trying to figure out what I’d done. And when I held up my hands, the stapler was still attached to my thumbs! I was bawling like a…well, like an 8 year old. And then my mother yelled at my father for having the stapler in the car. Then my father yelled at my mother for yelling at him about having the stapler in the car saying ‘how was I supposed to know she’d staple her fingers?’ But then they both yelled at my brother and sister because they thought it was really damn hilarious.
Once my siblings realized this was not the moment to push their luck, my parents had to deal with my poor thumbs. My father popped the lock on the bottom of the stapler to open it (so as to staple things onto a wall) and thank God, he saw that the staples didn’t ‘bend’ in my skin like they would have done around a few sheets of paper so they were just stuck in my flesh and didn’t have to be wiggled out or anything.
Oh, Lord, could you imagine trying to use one of those staple removers to yank out a staple from your kid’s thumbs? Gives me the willies just to imagine it!
After the staples were removed my thumbs started to bleed from the punctures…right onto my pretty polka dot sundress! My Daddy didn’t have anything in the car to stop the bleeding (which wasn’t really that bad but I kept crying and screaming “I need some boo-boo stickers!”) So my mother grabbed a couple of Kleenex out of her purse and wrapped them around my thumbs then my father went to the back of the car, got out the tool kit and found some silver duct tape. After a bit of good old fashioned ‘emergency lane’ doctoring my thumbs were taped (making it look like I’d had a nasty run in with a blender or something) and I was feeling a bit better.
By the time we made it into the church my tears had dried but my thumbs still bore witness to the fact that something had happened aboard the USS Williams that Sunday morning. Needless to say, my Daddy and I didn’t play tic-tac-toe or dots or hangman. And then for some inane reason I insisted we try to play ‘thumb war’. (No, actually I know why. I figured I had a unique ‘sympathy’ advantage being wounded and whatnot)
However, I quickly realized it was a really dumb request. The only thing that made the day not so utterly horrible was when my Daddy whispered in my ear as the minister was giving his sermon “Don’t worry, Pumpkin, after church and lunch we’ll go to the Cabarrus Creamery and you can get a double scoop of fudge rippled ice cream.”
Because it's common knowledge that ice cream makes everything better.
About the Author
L. Avery Brown, a former secondary level educator with an extensive background in US and European history, not only spent over a dozen years dedicated to teaching, special education, and curriculum development but she is also an accomplished orator and thespian in both standard theatre and musical theatre. Since stepping away from the education field in 2007, she has devoted her time to writing; something she's loved for as long as she can remember.
Professionally speaking, when Avery isn't busy working on her own projects, she is a literary liaison (helping her Indie Author friends and associates get everything ready for the big query so they don't feel like they're trying to move the world alone), a freelance editor, a manuscript evaluator, and -if she has time- she likes to review Indie Authored books.
Born and raised in 'The South', Avery, a Southern Belle by birth, currently resides in Austin, TX with her family.
To learn more about Avery, please visit her author's website www.laverybrown.com. Feel free to follow her on Twitter @LAveryBrown, too.
Impressum
Texte: L. Avery Brown
Bildmaterialien: L. Avery Brown
Tag der Veröffentlichung: 16.07.2013
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Widmung:
To my dear husband, with whom I like to giggle!