The Grand Exodus
Thursday, November 20, 2008 at 11:14PM All apologies to everyone!
I know I have been remiss in posting the final installment of the Jury Duty epic so dear to your hearts but I have been involved in a move, my dear readers. A return to my beloved Nor'East after 25 years of cultural, secular and intellectual solitude in the American South; a sentence I would only suggest for serial rapists, pederasts, pig thieves, contemporary country music fans and the fucking jesus freaks who prefer living down here in god's territory.
Namely, the people our original colonists banished to this horrible region. How prescient they were. Or what a hell stew they ignorantly started.
The American South is the Australia of the British Commonwealth. A penal colony too backward to be truly functionable, yet we like the climate, resources and land. Its inhabitants get up in arms now and again but we soothe them with liquor, race hate and not outlawing their defeated flag.
I can't say I'll miss it. Well, maybe the sunshine and near year round warmth. But that climatic trade-off has been too detrimental to my spirit.
I don't like it down here, never really have. I have always been treated as an outlander. The politics, false sense of politeness and "hospitality" has always rang false to me. It is a culture based on anti-intellectualism and the celebration of the simple and base in our nature. And always, always, the preservation of the status quo. Change here is slug-like and the people fear any ideas or behavior outside their comfort zone. Amazing that they were ever considered "rebels".
There's a reason the south and a swath of midwestern/northwestern states remain absurdly conservative. Primarily, they are white, christian, racist and don't care for dancing or sex for fun.
They despise the different. That is conservatism's essence. A resistance to change.
I am so thankful that in this period of my life, I am able to get out of this stagnant portion of the nation and begin to live again in a region of hope, diversity and urbanity.
Of course, that could change.
Give me about three months in a Jersey winter and I'll tell you if I feel the same way.
Love, concrete, savvy, streets, avenues, trains, lofts, attitude and a view,
C.
Reader Comments (4)
Thus bleats the voice of liberal "tolerance"... and as we love to tell elitists anxious to skedaddle: "Delta's ready when you are." We'll try to get that "NO VACANCY" sign at the border fixed before you try to whine your way back.
Twist a pig's ear and listen to him squeal.
Even a blind porker can find the (obvious) nut.
It is better to want what you have than to have what you want.