One Nation, Under Stars...

The lights came up on a cheering crowd that moments before were singing along to one of the most well known songs of the last fifty years – “Midnight Train To Georgia.” It was a warm and humid summer night at the outdoor amphitheater in the heart of Atlanta. Flashes of lightning raced across the evening sky announcing to us that the surrounding severe storms were being held at bay just long enough for us to finish our celebration.
We were watching Gladys Knight close out her half of the night’s entertainment with great anticipation for Smokie Robinson to come later. As the lights came up on the audience cheering the performance the crowd suddenly struck me in a way that they had not in my previous visits to this same venue to watch other such stars filled performances reminiscent of my youth. There was a good representation of the Atlanta social strata – at least those with enough money to be in attendance for the one-night performance of two of the great legends of Motown Records who were giving us a great show.
But the show was not what struck me – it was the crowd. In a quick moment I saw a picture of us that spoke thousands of words…
There was no break in the cross section of people that we have been told exists. We were ALL there singing and cheering together. Our media and certain politicians continually pound on our differences and try to drive wedges between us as a cultural group. I realize it’s their own attempt to be able to relate to us and ‘cubbyhole’ our interests, but it occurred to me that they are missing the point. Their divisive hate-speech prism no longer fits us. America has moved on, grown and matured.
We all listened as one faceless crowd to these two great performers croon from across the decadess and we were there to admire them and reminisce with them. They told their stories of coming from nothing and becoming superstars… They embodied ‘The American Dream Realized.’ They were the soundtracks that made up our lives. At the same time, they were showing us that our lives were all intermingled into one shared culture. We all had our own individual memories of their songs and what they meant to us, but while they represented individuality they were representative of a shared experience for us ALL as well. Among the gray hairs and baldheads were flashes of the youth we all were forced to leave behind while at the same time there was a look at the long road we have traveled. We now are showing the signs of age, but there is a bond there between us all. We were of a time of change in America that brought us from the tumult of the 1950s to the unity of the 2000s. No… we’re not perfect yet – get real – but we’ve all grown closer together as a nation. Those of the ‘hate nation’ – from ANY side – are no longer tolerated by the general public; THEY are now the pariahs. Words of derision and anger are working their way out of our lexicons to be replaced by a feeling of a shared path. And, no, it’s not our leaders or Hollywood or the media who are taking us down that path, it is an awakening of our own spirit and a recognition of our own ‘oneness as a nation’ that is moving us along.
And in that moment of recognition with that crowd at an open-air amphitheatre in the heart of the Old South – I was proud of us all. We have come a long way and it was OUR generation that brought us along that road. TOGETHER we will go the rest of the way to putting ‘hate nation’ people in a museum so future generations can look on them and ask, “What the hell were they thinking?”

Flip-Flop Mentality

My daughter and I were talking about the difference between living in the Northeast and living in the South. We both recognized the Northeast is very up-tight, rush-rush, grumbly and loud place – as a group. It seems like they’re always on edge about SOMETHING and more than happy to impose their views on the rest of us because they think they know everything and are right about everything.
Southerners, on the other hand, have a much more laid-back approach to life. Southerners have an easy-going approach to almost everything, laugh a lot, take their time and ‘smell the roses,’ and KNOW Northeasterners don’t know a whole lot and don’t care to have anything imposed on anyone.
My daughter claims it’s the result of Southerners wearing ‘flip-flops’ that makes the South so much more laid back. We’re talking about those rubber soles held on by two pieces of plastic or fabric you wear to the beach or the pool – not the flip-flops of John Kerry fame. Nowadays people wear flip-flops everywhere when the weather is warm enough in the South – and that’s more that half the year for most of us. Her argument is that flip-flops FORCE people to slow down or lose a shoe. You can’t run in them – the next best option being to take them off and run barefoot. And when you’re forced to slow down because your shoes won’t stay on, your whole life starts to slow down. You simply have more time to ‘smell the roses’ because you’re going by them more slowly and have more time to take them in.
My daughter also claims no doctor or scientist will ever verify her theory because we’re talking about a shoe not a drug. Everyone knows researchers are interested in controlled substances for controlling behavior. Flip-flops would be considered a ‘home remedy.’
So… as the Northeasterners take their prescriptions to control their stress, the South has a prescription of their own that has nothing to do with pharmaceutical companies and costs less than most co-pays… flip-flops.

Loving The South

In looking at some of the blogs I’ve put out there on The South you’d think I hated my time in the South. Nothing could be further from the truth… I love it here. I have seen most of the United States and a lot of the world and I’d say we have a very nice chunk of all that is good in the world right here.
The people here are the best. Let me give you some examples… and YES, I know there are exceptions to every rule, but for the most part Southerners PROVE the rules…
Most people in The South are good people who would ‘give you the shirt off their back’ if you asked them. They’re good, hard-working, intelligent people who like to live and play hard… as a generality. Despite what you hear outside The South about the people here being small minded or backward, nothing could be further from the truth. It’s a misconception based on a post-Civil War South that has been washed out over the years. Even the people who were around during the Civil Rights days are either old or dead and the people who have replaced them are some of the more progressive thinkers in the country when it comes to race relations. Is it perfect? No. Could it be better? Sure. But in MY experience I have found The South to be one of the less prejudiced areas of the country. There’s more integration, acceptance and inter-racial couples than anywhere else in the country. The Northeast was EXTREMELY polarized on race by comparison. They talk a good game up there, but they make The South look two centuries ahead in their REAL thinking. The Northeast is still locked into an ‘us versus them’ mentality. In The South that is being blotted out by an ‘all of us’ mentality. And the areas that seem to reflect the polarization of the Northeast the most are the big cities like Atlanta. Where people WANT to retain the ways of the pre-Civil Rights era you’ll find that kind of thinking. Where people want to move on… they have.
Sorry, California, I know the Beachboys thought California Girls were the best, but they MUST have been talking about transplanted Southerners. There’s nothing like the women of The South. Whether they are natives or if they came from somewhere else and have melted into The South, they are great. They smile, they’re generally friendly, they get sun most of the year so they have that nice complexion, they get more exercise so they’re fitter than women from The North and they seem to love life. And that includes their sports. I’ve never seen women who love their sports the way Southern women do. You’d think they were men. And I mean that in a good way…
Then there’s the weather in The South. Let’s face it, anyone who’s been through a winter… or forty… in The North knows how nice it is to be in The South where they don’t even own snow removal equipment. If we get one of those freak snowstorms do you know what they do?? They wait for it to melt off. It’s like a holiday!! Don’t go out and shovel off your driveway, go out and try to have a snowball fight before it melts off!! And generally it’s melting as it’s falling!! Since the kids rarely get a ‘snow day’ like the kids do up north the schools are quick to let the kids off when there’s a dusting out there. I can remember days when it was snowing up north and we’d have several inches and they STILL would go to school.
And we’re ALL close to a beach. No matter where you are in The South you’re pretty close to good beaches. There are some spectacular beaches in the northeast, but the water NEVER GETS WARM. Not the case in The South. The water warms up in March in Florida and stays that way until October. Okay, for four months you have water that’s only as warm as northeast water in July, but for the rest of the year… WOW!!
So, just to put your mind at ease about how I feel about The South… I love it here. Don’t look for me to move back to The North unless you force me there at gunpoint!!!

Southern Driving Test

It took me a while to understand what was going on with the drivers in The South. In an earlier blog I mentioned that they all think they're NASCAR drivers. Well, I understand now why they drive like that and who teaches them to do it.
I took my stepson to take his drivers' test and suddenly it all became crystal clear.
At the time the state of Georgia did not require drivers take a certified driving course before they applied for their license. Uh... what was that? No Drivers’ Ed classes?? All you had to done was get a permit and drive with your parent for a year and you're good to go. Did anyone notice how poorly the PARENTS were driving?? I guess it's not a requirement for them to be driving well to qualify as a sort of instructor to their kids... and this whole incestuous system where generations of bad drivers are teaching new generations all their bad habits… it suddenly starts to makes sense why they are all making the same mistakes over and over.
Then there’s the ‘test.’ It’s a right of passage for all kids that age. However, the test itself is ludicrous when lookesd at as someone who has driven enough miles to have driven to the Moon and back a couple times and has taught otherrs to be professional drivers. There is a point to taking the 'driving test' and it's to see if you know what you're doing behind the wheel of a car.
The 'test track' is set up in a parking lot with a bunch of cones. I suppose they don't want to take the chance that one of their new drivers will run into someone while they're taking their test. Nerves alone causes a lot of them to fail – and since that’s about all that could cause them to fail they need to keep them confined.
There's nothing to test the skills of these kids. Nothing to determine whether or not they can handle a car in traffic or on the freeway (that's Interstate for all you Southerners). They have to drive between the cones (which most of them have trouble with) back up between the cones (which usually results in disaster) and do a couple turning maneuvers. Ta da!! You get your license. It's more difficult to feed a dollar bill into the changer on a vending machine and push the button.
Okay, now you have this kid who JUST got their new license taking this test monkeys were passing and their proud parents go out and get them a brand new Mustang. And not one with a small engine that just looks cool, no, they give them one of those that will destroy itself if it revs on the starting line for too long! It makes ALL THE SENSE IN THE WORLD to give a kid who has demonstrated he can figure out where the keys goes a car with 400 horses under the hood.
However, the funeral business is staying flush as a result.

Passing For News

I was watching evening television and the news 'teaser' came on here in Atlanta. The big 'teaser' for tonight to get me to watch the late news was the same story I read on Yahoo this afternoon! "Jobs that pay $40/ hour." Really?? That’s ALL that’s going on down here?
Let me see if I can help.
How about the murdering professor who is still on the loose and the cops have no leads? Or what about the most recent ‘scare’ over the Swine Flu? Even covering the Falcons draft choices might be better than reading me the headlines from Yahoo this afternoon!!
Oh well… The South is still stuck in ‘small town’ mentality when the ‘big city’ has moved in.
Up in New York the stories might easily have been lost in all the other killings of the day. Kings County Hospital in Brooklyn is one of the best gunshot trauma centers in the world because they deal with more gunshots than anyone in the world – including war zones. So, another killing could easily be overlooked as hohum. The flu might be a story in the second hour since most of the known cases of the flu in this country are centered in St. Francis High School in Queens. It’s a HUGE high school right off the Long Island Expressway in Queens where any afternoon thousands of kids can be seen standing around looking for a ride, so most people who drive the LIE to go home know where it is. So, it probably would not be a lost story. HERE, however, the big story is the $40/ hour jobs. I guess unemployment in the South has taken precedent over killings or the flu!!
Just a thought to the local news people, rethink your strategy.

Sitting In Traffic

One of the things about the South I find the most… interesting… is the ability of Southerners to sit in traffic. It’s eerie. They don’t seem to mind. It’s like they accept that traffic is what it is and they’re good with it. Every once in awhile you’ll see where one of them finally cooks off and has a case of ‘road rage,’ but for the most part they seem perfectly willing to sit in traffic and accept that this is the way it is.
I hate to point this out, but a lot of the problem with the traffic situation – at least in Atlanta – has been brought on by the lack of interest by the local governments in timing out the stoplights. Or maybe they know that and don’t care.
Let me lay this out and see if it makes sense to any of YOU. In the greater Atlanta area there is a problem with jurisdictions overlapping. Counties run into each other and when roads cross county lines the next county refuses to cooperate with the previous county. They don’t want to work with their neighbors. Uh… that doesn’t help those of us who have to drive on those roads. What we need is for the counties to work together, barring that we need the state to get in there and get the counties to do their jobs. Time out those lights! Instead of there being demand lights at every neighborhood, have a computer override the demands and move us along. My KIDS were doing that 20 years ago with a Sim City game they were playing on the computer. Getting the traffic flowing – particularly with all the bellyaching they do about saving gas and having smaller carbon footprints – should be a top priority.

But it’s not.

So what we have are a bunch of very polite people sitting in traffic waiting to lose their minds. I’m convinced there must be something in the water down here that allows these people to be able to sit in this kind of unnecessary traffic every day and not lose it. Wow…

NASCAR South

I came to the South from New York. Not upstate, but NYC!!
I got to NYC from Cincinnati via Los Angeles. Then there were short stays in Chicago, Boston, Cleveland, Buffalo and Toronto. As you can see, even though I grew up in rural Cincinnati, I spent a lot of years in BIG cities in the North – with 20 in The Big Apple. Migrating South has been an eye-opening experience for me – to say the least.
I don’t think people in New York City understand that people outside their ‘perfect Mecca’ (and I use that term in the silliest possible context) are pretty much the same as they are, but with a different point of view. Southerners grow up where there are actual trees and grass rather than pictures of it that you can visit at the Metropolitan Museum of Art or Central Park where they imported grass and trees for people to use as cover for muggings. Having that ‘wide open’ mentality gives people in the South a whole different take on the world.
A lot of my experiences so far are centered around Atlanta – which is rapidly becoming the New York of the South in the good AND the bad ways. At the same time, I get out to Alabama, the Carolinas, Tennessee and Florida on a regular basis, so I have a pretty broad base of experiences here to draw on.
Let’s start with driving – just for kicks. Bear in mind I love people from both the North AND the South, so I’m NOT targeting anyone!!! I just think the comparisons are hilarious and I want to share my take on them with you.
Southerners are speeders when they drive. I think it’s an American hobby to see how fast you can go for how far without getting caught, but Southerners are taking it to an artform. In the South they think they’re either NASCAR drivers or are auditioning to BE NASCAR drivers. And the Interstates of the South are good training grounds for that aspiration. The Interstate lanes are wide and there’s not a whole lot out there until you get to Atlanta or Macon. Otherwise, almost everyone knows Georgia is the state to ‘make up time’ when you’re on your way from up north going to Florida. Georgia JUST passed a law to add extra fines for people traveling at over 85 mph in 55-70 mph zones. For Southerners that’s just another challenge. All that means is the cops are going to have to work that much harder to pull over cars traveling over 85 – and Southerners are not going to pull it over easily. Give me a break. I travel the Interstates of Georgia all the time. In zones with a posted limit of 55 I’ll be scooting along at 70 and be looking for cops at every bend in the road. What was I thinking?? That’s the Northern training coming into effect. At 70 in a 55 zone you need to be over in the ‘old lady’ lane all the way to the right. There will be drivers on your behind flashing their lights if you’re in one of the other lanes. The ‘old ladies’ will give you a nasty look as they blow by at about 100 as they race the Beemers and the SUVs trying to get up the Interstate. There are a lot of those German cars built for the Autobahn that can run at over 100 with NO problem.
I have to say, though, as good as these guys in the South are they need to take their talents up to NYC and see how good they REALLY are. You see, there’s a lot more people on the Interstates and Parkways up there, they’re ALL moving at 80-100 mph (you don’t have a choice) and they’re inches apart – a lot like NASCAR drivers REALLY drive on the tracks. One mistake and cars pile up for miles.
Ah, but there’s more. You see, in NYC the Interstates and Parkways are NOT the wide roads of the South. The lanes on the Interstates are a lot NARROWER up there!! It takes REAL talent and nerves to drive on THOSE roads!! AND to do it with people who have the ‘New York Attitude!’ So if you want to test your talents as a driver, go up to The Big Apple and give those roads a go!! Just be warned, the drivers up there are used to driving on those narrow roads and they carry a loaded finger!!