safe southern attribute
I have lived with the slightest southern accent my whole life and it's something that I have tried very, very hard to cover up. On most occasions, my accent leads people to believe that I am the worst kind of southerner and I should be treated accordingly. People think I am a racist, sexist, Nascar fan, hunter, pick up truck owner, tobacco chewer, titty bar regular, and just plain stupid. These conclusions are easy to jump too and I am used to it. Most of the time the people that think these things of me are people I could care less about anyway. However, there are times when having a southern accent comes in handy. Certainly the charm of the southern gentleman has long been a seduction technique that has worked for traveling "rebs" on more than one occasion and I am as guilty as the next Reb for working the magic on the Yankee girls that lift their skirts so easily when they hear the syrupy sounds of Dixie.
The southern persona for all of it's faults does carry with it a terrific stigma that is a joy to own up too. The only time I can think of that being from the south is considered a measure of quality is when people are referring to cooking. Someone who grew up in the north, having never seen the Mason-Dixon line in their life, and would never willing admit that they have southern roots, will stand on a table top and shout at the top of their lungs that they have southern roots, only when it comes to their prowess in the kitchen. "OF COURSE I CAN COOK!!!! MY GRANDMOTHER IS FROM MEMPHIS!!" As if to say, "You can't doubt my ability to do long division, my grandfather is from India." It has the same ring to it.
My whole life, the dark shadow of my southern-ness has haunted me. I try to talk to people and they will catch a word and feel the need to repeat it to me in a mocking mimicry. "You said, yeee-allllll. I heard you say, yeee-alll. Say it again" Yes, you silly shit, I said, Ya'll. People love to do this and it takes away from whatever I might have been talking about. I could be revealing the cure of cancer on live television - billions of people watching and I could stumble into "ya'll" and half the world would think that i was joking from that point on. The other half wouldn't believe me because southerners are notoriously stupid and there is no way that someone from Missouri could have cured cancer in between Nascar races and professional wrestling.
Cooking. For some reason, southerners have all the glory. (And everywhere south of America as well) It's as if the southern accent is added to the food and it makes it taste better. Fried chicken made from someone in North Dakota will never taste as good as the fried chicken made by someone in Alabama, even if the person in North Dakota had made it a million times and the person in Alabama bought theirs frozen and heated it up in the microwave. I have tasted a lot of southern food and not all of it's the power and the glory that people claim it to be. I have eaten some food that is so rich in salt, butter, lard and Lawry's that is practically death on a stick. It touches your lips and your heart just stops. You would swear that some of the food is just deep fried colon cancer.
There are great cooks all over the world and it strikes me that the only true trait of a great chef is that they have American southern roots. The greatest French chef with all the fame, glory and respect in the world is nothing compared to Martha Rodgers of 4920 Alcorn Street, Deven, Tennessee. That French Chef could cook up the greatest tasting food in the world. It could lull you to sleep with it's grandeur, but Martha can make a casserole that will literally kill you if you just smell it and there isn't a food competition in the world that would disagree with her. French chef was schooled for five years in the greatest restaurant in the world, Martha was taught as a child and has only cooked for the toughest critics in the world since she started rolling bisquit dough at the age of five. Southerners, are picky. Regardless of what you hear about eating roadkill, pickled pig's feet and that stuff. It doesn't sound good, but it tastes like an orgasm.
For those southerners that don't know how to cook, the stigma is just another in a long line of anxieties to live with. I have been invited to dinner parties, backyard cookouts and other festive occasions where I am asked if I will cook fried chicken for everyone. This happens to me all the time and thankfully I know how to cook fried chicken but if I didn't then I'm sure I would be freaking out. I know that if I didn't, that I would claim that I could and I'm sure that everyone would expect it to be the best in the world and then I would be spending the rest of time trying to figure out how to disguise Kentucky Fried Chicken so it tasted like I made it. I'm sure every group with a stigma must feel this way; the not well hung black man, the low key red head, the non-drinking Irishman, the Canadian that doesn't know the rules to hockey, the tall guy that doesn't like basketball and the non-bisexual stripper. Sadly, every stigma group pretends that the stigma applies to them even when, deep down, they wish they didn't have too. I wonder how many tall people have disappointed groups of driveway basketball players that picked them first for their team only to watch their hopes be dashed with every air ball that Mr. Amazingly Tall lofts over the backboard? (for you Canadians that don't know your hockey, that's the blue line)
Southern man - long ago a trait to be proud of. Something that women swooned over and men respected. The accent was as close to a well-educated dialect as an American could have but today it's more well known for it's moron-like qualities. The southern accent, which once stood proud as the voice of individual spirit and was once the very definition of the power of a people to rise up against it's own nation when it felt that it stood in disagreement with it, is now an accent of the easily fooled, tricked and shammed by a corrupt government that southerners believe in, sadly, to the death. The southern accent which was once the very voice of reason is now the reason that most Americans don't have a voice at all. It's heartbreaking....
But we can still cook...
Not all of us.
The southern persona for all of it's faults does carry with it a terrific stigma that is a joy to own up too. The only time I can think of that being from the south is considered a measure of quality is when people are referring to cooking. Someone who grew up in the north, having never seen the Mason-Dixon line in their life, and would never willing admit that they have southern roots, will stand on a table top and shout at the top of their lungs that they have southern roots, only when it comes to their prowess in the kitchen. "OF COURSE I CAN COOK!!!! MY GRANDMOTHER IS FROM MEMPHIS!!" As if to say, "You can't doubt my ability to do long division, my grandfather is from India." It has the same ring to it.
My whole life, the dark shadow of my southern-ness has haunted me. I try to talk to people and they will catch a word and feel the need to repeat it to me in a mocking mimicry. "You said, yeee-allllll. I heard you say, yeee-alll. Say it again" Yes, you silly shit, I said, Ya'll. People love to do this and it takes away from whatever I might have been talking about. I could be revealing the cure of cancer on live television - billions of people watching and I could stumble into "ya'll" and half the world would think that i was joking from that point on. The other half wouldn't believe me because southerners are notoriously stupid and there is no way that someone from Missouri could have cured cancer in between Nascar races and professional wrestling.
Cooking. For some reason, southerners have all the glory. (And everywhere south of America as well) It's as if the southern accent is added to the food and it makes it taste better. Fried chicken made from someone in North Dakota will never taste as good as the fried chicken made by someone in Alabama, even if the person in North Dakota had made it a million times and the person in Alabama bought theirs frozen and heated it up in the microwave. I have tasted a lot of southern food and not all of it's the power and the glory that people claim it to be. I have eaten some food that is so rich in salt, butter, lard and Lawry's that is practically death on a stick. It touches your lips and your heart just stops. You would swear that some of the food is just deep fried colon cancer.
There are great cooks all over the world and it strikes me that the only true trait of a great chef is that they have American southern roots. The greatest French chef with all the fame, glory and respect in the world is nothing compared to Martha Rodgers of 4920 Alcorn Street, Deven, Tennessee. That French Chef could cook up the greatest tasting food in the world. It could lull you to sleep with it's grandeur, but Martha can make a casserole that will literally kill you if you just smell it and there isn't a food competition in the world that would disagree with her. French chef was schooled for five years in the greatest restaurant in the world, Martha was taught as a child and has only cooked for the toughest critics in the world since she started rolling bisquit dough at the age of five. Southerners, are picky. Regardless of what you hear about eating roadkill, pickled pig's feet and that stuff. It doesn't sound good, but it tastes like an orgasm.
For those southerners that don't know how to cook, the stigma is just another in a long line of anxieties to live with. I have been invited to dinner parties, backyard cookouts and other festive occasions where I am asked if I will cook fried chicken for everyone. This happens to me all the time and thankfully I know how to cook fried chicken but if I didn't then I'm sure I would be freaking out. I know that if I didn't, that I would claim that I could and I'm sure that everyone would expect it to be the best in the world and then I would be spending the rest of time trying to figure out how to disguise Kentucky Fried Chicken so it tasted like I made it. I'm sure every group with a stigma must feel this way; the not well hung black man, the low key red head, the non-drinking Irishman, the Canadian that doesn't know the rules to hockey, the tall guy that doesn't like basketball and the non-bisexual stripper. Sadly, every stigma group pretends that the stigma applies to them even when, deep down, they wish they didn't have too. I wonder how many tall people have disappointed groups of driveway basketball players that picked them first for their team only to watch their hopes be dashed with every air ball that Mr. Amazingly Tall lofts over the backboard? (for you Canadians that don't know your hockey, that's the blue line)
Southern man - long ago a trait to be proud of. Something that women swooned over and men respected. The accent was as close to a well-educated dialect as an American could have but today it's more well known for it's moron-like qualities. The southern accent, which once stood proud as the voice of individual spirit and was once the very definition of the power of a people to rise up against it's own nation when it felt that it stood in disagreement with it, is now an accent of the easily fooled, tricked and shammed by a corrupt government that southerners believe in, sadly, to the death. The southern accent which was once the very voice of reason is now the reason that most Americans don't have a voice at all. It's heartbreaking....
But we can still cook...
Not all of us.
posted by Daniel Loomis | 5:31 PM
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