If you are eccentric, at least harmlessly so, the South, in my experience is not a bad place to live. In the small town South people will tolerate you and look out for you. We have some of that in the Midwest, at least the small town Midwest.
Thought For The Day
- Donald R. McClarey
Donald R. McClarey
Cradle Catholic. Active in the pro-life movement since 1973. Father of three, one in Heaven, and happily married for 43 years. Small town lawyer and amateur historian. Former president of the board of directors of the local crisis pregnancy center for a decade.
Better to bemusedly tolerate a freak than to put them center stage and convince them they are * wonderful*!
Something of a “freak” herself, Florence King somewhere lists the bona-fide characters of the typical Southern town of times past: the functioning alcoholic [lawyer, usually], the Lovely Person [extremely naive but kind lady], the Confirmed Bachelor, and so on. Her own mother–a lady, not “trash,” mind you–answered a friend’s compliment about her daughter Florence by answering, “Yes, and she can spell like a son of a bitch.” Pure Southern.
Brings to mind the show “Designing Women” in which a character observed, “ I’m saying this is the South, and we’re proud of our crazy people. We don’t hide them up in the attic. We bring ’em right down to the living room and show ’em off. See, Phyllis, no one in the South ever asks if you have crazy people in your family. They just ask what side they’re on.”
A friend in Charlotte is quite a character. She is descended from Charleston and Beaufort S C families. She introduced herself to me saying, ” I have my kennel papers from Charleston. All my family is crazy. I am the only one that is certified”. Which was true. She had had a nervous breakdown as an ensign and had a stay in Ward 7 of a Naval Hospital. She was talented in craft therapy so much so she was making chess sets for the corpsmen, nurses and other patients in the ward.