I may be a Mets fan, but I’m a Yankee through and through
(Inspired by Blog Antagonist.)
I spent a total of three months “living” in the South – March through June 1996 at Keesler Air Force Base in Biloxi, Mississippi. Other than that brief stay in the heart of Dixie, the farthest south I ever lived was Arlington, Virginia. And until we moved to Colorado, the farthest west I ever lived was Dayton, Ohio – where I grew up.
While I didn’t particularly enjoy my time in Biloxi – I don’t gamble and I’m not fond of finding roaches inside the toilet paper roll – I know better than to judge an entire region of our country based on my isolated experience. So I will not bash the South.
But I’ll admit that I’m pretty sure the South didn’t like me from the get-go.
In college, I had a boyfriend who was a cadet at VMI – the Virginia Military Institute – in Lexington, Virginia. His family lived about an hour away from VMI, also in the southwestern part of Virginia.
My parents had recently moved to Northern Virginia, just outside the Beltway. On one of my visits to see them, I took a bus down to visit my boyfriend and spend the weekend at his parents’ house.
I may not have left the state of Virginia, but I traveled to a whole different world. And I didn’t even realize that I wasn’t going to fit in.
His mother made fried chicken for dinner. I don’t eat fried chicken. I don’t like eating meat off the bone. I’ll eat a pork chop or a T-bone – and you’ll probably be appalled by how much meat I’ll leave behind – but I draw the line at fried chicken.
I didn’t even have the sense to claim that I was a vegetarian. I merely said no thank you. She was not impressed.
But I think the moment I was officially branded with her disapproval was when I thanked her for her hospitality and bid her farewell – with wet hair and wearing a thin robe from Victoria’s Secret.
I had just stepped out of the shower when my boyfriend knocked on the bathroom door to tell me that his parents were leaving for church and did I want to say goodbye?
Of course I did. I had been trying – unsuccessfully – all weekend to make up for the fried chicken incident.
I towel-dried my hair, threw on my robe, and flung open the door to find his parents standing right there. The looks on their faces were priceless.
I shook their hands and said thank you as effusively as I possibly could, and then I ducked back into the bathroom, knowing that I had just sealed my status as the bad girlfriend. The slutty Catholic Yankee who didn’t eat meat.
(If only they’d known I was really a heathen.)
So I’ll try the collard greens. And the giblet gravy. And really, how can grits be so bad if you slather them with butter?
But just please don’t serve me fried chicken.
November 24th, 2006 at 8:55 pm
the parents were leaving for church and they had BF pull you out of the shower to say goodbye???
Well hell! They’re just lucky you did not pop out of the door wearing only a towel!
BTW – I know it is bad but I loves me some fried chicken (i never did have to try the grits when I lived down south!)
November 24th, 2006 at 8:58 pm
Oh they can be that bad, trust me. Even smothered in butter. Yech.
My mother inlaw actually makes delectable fried chicken, but she uses boneless skinless breasts. I can’t abide gnawing flesh from a bone either.
MS is ten times worse than GA. After visiting there, I swore to my husband that I would never complain about the humidity in GA ever again. 3 months would be about 2 months and 3 weeks more than I could stomach!
November 24th, 2006 at 10:11 pm
You know what I have to say about all this, so I’ll just say
YES. And YES.
November 24th, 2006 at 10:40 pm
Yikky. Don’t like the fried chicken at all.
But my scary-”redneck” boyfriend experience came in Ohio! I had to hide under a desk while his ex-step-father came to visit his son (my boyfriend’s half-brother). Apparently, he had quite a temper, so toted his shotgun around all the time. He wouldn’t want his son to be around a woman, hence my need to hide.
There were so many combination cousin-step-half-sibling-father-in-law type folks I couldn’t keep ‘em all straight.
And yeah, they tried to serve me fried chicken.
November 25th, 2006 at 8:13 am
Ha! I love it! Slutty or not, you are so my friend. (Even if you are a yankee.)
Oh and I HATE fried chicken. What did I just eat? A tendon? What’s that stringy thing? An artery? Why would anyone want to chew on a carcuss?
November 25th, 2006 at 12:15 pm
“The slutty Catholic Yankee who didn’t eat meat.”
Hey!! Wait a minute here, lady… that’s me!
I truly understand your pain. Living in San Antonio for six months was surreal. Within my first five minutes out of the airport I wound up with the imprint of a taxi’s front seat on my face. I told the driver where I wanted to go and he slammed on the brakes. “You’re not from around here, are you?” Mmmno, no I’m not. That would be the theme throughout the duration of my stay. And when I got home I thought everyone sounded weird.
November 25th, 2006 at 2:22 pm
They knew you’d just gotten out of the shower and were waiting outside the door? What else could they possibly have expected?
You should just be really really glad they’re not your ‘in-laws’ now.
November 25th, 2006 at 2:41 pm
There’s a reason I refer to my present geographic location as Calcutta, USA.
I’m going on, wait for it, 11 years. ELEVEN FUCKING YEARS IN CALCUTTA. And I’ve yet to eat a grit. Nary a grit shall pass these lips. Nary a one.
November 25th, 2006 at 3:32 pm
Julie, I grew up in a town about an hour away from VMI in southwest Virginia. I can practically smell the fried chicken they tried to feed you. Heh. You are lucky they didn’t feed you country ham. I am dying to know exactly where you were. I live in South Carolina now and there is a common saying around here, “Thank God for Mississippi”. Means we are 49th instead of 50th in most things like literacy rates. They may put it on the license plates. Great post, as usual.
November 29th, 2006 at 8:16 am
My F-I-L gave a toast at our wedding rehearsal dinner and said that they never dreamed that their son would marry a liberal communist yankee Catholic, but they loved me anyway.
November 30th, 2006 at 11:57 am
believe it or not, i was conceived on keesler afb. and to this day, my mother still thinks it was “keebler.” like elfin magic.
and i can make my sister vomit by saying “vein” while she’s eating chicken or any other meat. fun at parties!