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North and South
Feb. 12th, 2009 04:42 pmIf things go as planned, we could be living in Athens for a major chunk of time. I mean, we bought a house; in some ways it would be really bad if we moved before 5-8 years are up. In 5 years Casper will be 10 and Dillo will be 7, and they'll have lived their entire lives in the South.
Growing up, mostly in New England, the South was a foreign country to me, and I was as guilty as anyone of stereotyping Southerners. The mere existence of Jesse Helms didn't exactly help matters. Now I've lived here coming up on 7 years and it's still not home to me, though I have learned a lot. Athens is a lot more Southern than Durham, so I've got new learning to do. But home to me is still a place with actual winter, and wood stoves, and oil heat, and Italian-Americans and Irish-Americans.
And, of course, Southerners stereotype Northerners, too. This was a cheesy little piece of cliche in the student paper this am (about a baseball player who spent the summer in Cape Cod):
"And few things will make a person tougher than surviving a summer of Northern hospitality.
"The people are a lot more friendly in the South, I will say that," Poythress said with a laugh. "The food was a little different and stuff like that, but I was around baseball players every second of the day so it was fine."
For Poythress, it also didn't help that the North couldn't find any sweet tea, either.
"The very first time I asked for sweet tea, I knew they wouldn't have it, somebody just looked at me like I was crazy and said, 'We have sugar' and I said 'That's fine,'" he said."
I wonder if I'll be like my grandparents, who moved to Cincinnati in 1946, but vacationed on Cape Cod the whole time, and as soon as my grandfather retired in the mid 1970s moved back to the Cape for good. I also wonder if my kids will be like my father, who moved to Cincinnati as an infant, left after medical school, but eventually moved back.
What about you? Is where you were raised still "home"?
Growing up, mostly in New England, the South was a foreign country to me, and I was as guilty as anyone of stereotyping Southerners. The mere existence of Jesse Helms didn't exactly help matters. Now I've lived here coming up on 7 years and it's still not home to me, though I have learned a lot. Athens is a lot more Southern than Durham, so I've got new learning to do. But home to me is still a place with actual winter, and wood stoves, and oil heat, and Italian-Americans and Irish-Americans.
And, of course, Southerners stereotype Northerners, too. This was a cheesy little piece of cliche in the student paper this am (about a baseball player who spent the summer in Cape Cod):
"And few things will make a person tougher than surviving a summer of Northern hospitality.
"The people are a lot more friendly in the South, I will say that," Poythress said with a laugh. "The food was a little different and stuff like that, but I was around baseball players every second of the day so it was fine."
For Poythress, it also didn't help that the North couldn't find any sweet tea, either.
"The very first time I asked for sweet tea, I knew they wouldn't have it, somebody just looked at me like I was crazy and said, 'We have sugar' and I said 'That's fine,'" he said."
I wonder if I'll be like my grandparents, who moved to Cincinnati in 1946, but vacationed on Cape Cod the whole time, and as soon as my grandfather retired in the mid 1970s moved back to the Cape for good. I also wonder if my kids will be like my father, who moved to Cincinnati as an infant, left after medical school, but eventually moved back.
What about you? Is where you were raised still "home"?
