Literary Destinations in England

I doubt this list is nearly complete, so feel free to comment if you see anything missing. I went to England about ten years ago and visited a few of these sites (which I've starred)--wish I had a digital camera back then, but I guess it gives me an excuse to go back (as if I needed one)! The photos below are the ones I took with my 35mm.


BERKSHIRE
Church Cottage, home of Kenneth Graham – Pangbourne

BUCKINGHAMSHIRE

*John Milton's Cottage - Chalfont St. Giles (pictured)

CUMBRIA
*World of Beatrix Potter- Bowness
*Dove Cottage, home of William Wordsworth - Grasmere (pictured)
*Hill Top, home of Beatrix Potter - Near Sawrey


DORSET
*Thomas Hardy's Cottage - Dorchester
Dorset County Museum, Thomas Hardy - Dorchester

KENT
Charles Dickens' Bleak House Dickens Maritime & Smuggling - Broadstairs (now a private residence, no longer open to the public)
Charles Dickens House Museum - Broadstairs
Geoffrey Chaucer Centre - Canterbury
Geoffrey Chaucer's Canterbury Tales - Canterbury
Dickens World (Charles Dickens-themed amusement park) – Chatham Maritime
The Royal Victoria and Bull Hotel, haunt of Charles Dickens - Rochester
Charles Dickens Centre - Rochester
Frances Hodgson Burnett's Great Maytham Hall - Rolvenden
Lamb House, home of Henry James - Rye

HAMPSHIRE
*Chawton House, Home of Jane Austen - Alton
William Cobbett, walking trail - Selborne
Charles Dickens Birthplace - Portsmouth

LONDON

*The Charles Dickens House Museum
*Shakespeare's Globe Theater (reconstruction) (pictured)

NOTINGHAMSHIRE
*Sherwood Forest - Edwinstowe

OXFORDSHIRE
Mapledurham House [John Galsworthy, Kenneth Graham & Alexander Pope] - Mapledurham
Alice's Shop, inspiration for Lewis Carrol - Oxford
Thames River, inspiration for Lewis Carrol - Oxford
The Eagle & Child Pub, haunt of C.S. Lewis & J.R.R. Tolkein – Oxford

SOMERSET
*Jane Austen Centre - Bath

EAST SUSSEX

*Bateman's, home of Rudyard Kipling - Burwash (pictured)
*Pooh Corner, inspiration for A.A. Milne - Hartfield
*Ashdown Forest (A.A. Milne's 100 Acre Wood) - Hartfield
Monk's House, retreat of Virginia Woolf - Lewes

WARWICKSHIRE
*Shakespeare's Birthplace - Stratford-Upon-Avon (pictured)
*Anne Hathaway's Cottage (Shakespeare's wife) - Stratford-Upon-Avon
*Hall's Croft (home of Shakespeare's daughter) - Stratford-Upon-Avon
*Mary Arden's House (Shakespeare's mother) - Stratford-Upon-Avon (pictured)
*New Place, Shakespeare's retirement house - Stratford-Upon-Avon


YORKSHIRE
*Bronte Parsonage Museum - Haworth

Literary Destinations in the United States

Several years ago, I got it in my head to start a website (this was before blogging had become mainstream), which I ultimately determined to be more trouble than it was worth. Anyway, part of the site was devoted to literary destinations--primarily homes of famous authors. Visiting these homes combined my passion for literature and travel, and they continue to be favorite destinations of mine. I compiled a list of these locations using travel guides, web browsing, etc. and I thought it was worth posting here as a reference. I've starred the ones I've visited, and included some of my personal photos.
Please feel free to comment if you know of a site that is missing. My goal is to compile the most comprehensive list possible. However, please note that this is a list of sites which are open to the public--this seems obvious, but someone once contributed a photo he'd taken of a current bestselling author's private home, something I do not want to encourage!

UNITED STATES

ALABAMA
*F. Scott & Zelda Fitzgerald Museum - Montgomery, AL (pictured)
Helen Keller Birthplace: Ivy Green - Tuscumbia, AL

ARKANSAS
The [Ernest] Hemingway-Pfeiffer Museum - Piggott, AR

CALIFORNIA
Zane Grey's The Pueblo - Avalon, CA
Robinson Jeffer's Tor House - Carmel, CA
Jack London State Historic Park - Glen Ellen, CA
John Muir National Historic Site - Martinez, CA
Eugene O'Neill's Tao House - Danville, CA
Will Rogers Historic Park - Pacific Palisades, CA
John Steinbeck's Birthplace & Boyhood Home - Salinas, CA
Robert Louis Stevenson House - Monterey, CA
The Silverado Museum: Robert Louis Stevenson memorabilia collection - St. Helena, CA
Mark Twain Cabin - Sonora, CA

CONNECTICUT
Eugene O'Neill's Monte Cristo Cottage - New London, CT
*Harriet Beecher Stowe House & Center - Hartford, CT
*Mark Twain House - Hartford, CT (pictured)
*Noah Webster House - Hartford, CT

FLORIDA
Robert Frost Cottage - Key West, FL
Ernest Hemingway Home & Museum - Key West, FL
Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings State Historic Site - Cross Creek, FL

GEORGIA

*Joel Chandler Harris' The Wren's Nest - Atlanta, GA (pictured)
Uncle Remus Museum - Eatonon, GA
Sidney Lanier Cottage - Macon, GA
*Margaret Mitchell House & Museum - Atlanta, GA

IDAHO
Ezra Pound Birthplace - Hailey, ID

ILLINOIS
Ernest Hemingway Birthplace - Oak Park, IL
Vachel Lindsay Home - Springfield, IL
Edgar Lee Masters Memorial Museum - Petersburg, IL
Carl Sandburg Historic Site - Galesburg, IL

INDIANA
James Whitcomb Riley Birthplace & Childhood Home - Greenfield, IN
*James Whitcomb Riley's Lockerbie Home - Indianapolis, IN
Gene Stratton-Porter's Limberlost - Geneva, IN
Gene Stratton-Porter State Historic Site, Limberlost North - Rome City, IN

LOUISIANA
Kate Chopin House - Cloutierville, LA

MAINE
Sarah Orne Jewett House - South Beswick, ME
Henry Wadsworth-Longfellow House - Portland, ME

MARYLAND
*Edgar Allan Poe House & Museum - Baltimore, MD

MASSACHUSETTS

*William Cullen Bryant Homestead - Cummington, MA
*Louisa May Alcott's Orchard House - Concord, MA
*Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Wayside - Concord, MA
*Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Old Manse - Concord, MA
*Nathaniel Hawthorne's Little Red House - Lenox, MA
*Nathaniel Hawthorne's Birthplace - Salem, MA
*Nathaniel Hawthorne's House of Seven Gables - Salem, MA (pictured)
*Emily Dickinson Homestead - Amherst, MA
*Herman Melville's Arrowhead - Pittsfield, MA
*Henry David Thoreau's Walden Pond - Concord, MA
*Henry Wadsworth-Longfellow National Historic Site - Cambridge, MA
*The Mount, home of Edith Wharton's The Mount - Lenox, MA (pictured)
John Greenleaf Whittier Home - Amesbury, MA
John Greenleaf Whittier Homestead - Haverhill, MA


MINNESOTA
Sinclair Lewis Boyhood Home - Sauk Center, MN
Laura Ingalls Wilder Museum - Walnut Grove, MN

MISSISSIPPI
William Faulkner's Rowan Oak - Oxford, MI
William Johnson House - Natchez, MI

MISSOURI
Eugene Field House - St. Louis, MO
Mark Twain Boyhood Home & Museum - Hannibal, MO
Laura Ingalls Wilder Home - Mansfield, MO

NEBRASKA
Bess Streeter Aldrich House & Museum - Elmwood, NE
Willa Cather Childhood Home - Red Cloud, NE

NEW HAMPSHIRE
Robert Frost Farm -Derry, NH
Robert Frost Home & Museum - Franconia, NH

NEW JERSEY

*Walt Whitman House - Camden, NJ (pictured)

NEW MEXICO
D.H. Lawrence Home - Taos, NM

NEW YORK
William Cullen Bryant's Cedarmere - Roslyn Harbor (Long Island), NY
*Washington Irving's Sunnyside - Tarrytown, NY
Christopher Morley's Writing Studio, The Knothole - Roslyn, NY
Edgar Allan Poe Cottage - Bronx, NY
Robert Louis Stevenson Memorial Cottage - Saranac Lake, NY
Walt Whitman Birthplace - Huntington Station, NY

NORTH CAROLINA
Carl Sandburg Home - Flat Rock, NC
Thomas Wolfe Memorial - Asheville, NC

OHIO
Paul Laurence Dunbar House - Dayton, OH
*Harriet Beecher Stowe House - Cincinnati, OH

OKLAHOMA
Will Rogers Birthplace - Oologah, OK
Sequoyah's Homesite - Sallisaw, OK
Laura Ingalls Wilder Surveyor-s House - De Smet, SD

PENNSYLVANIA

Pearl S. Buck House - Perkasie, PA
Zane Grey Museum - Lackawaxen, PA
*Edgar Allan Poe National Historic Site - Philadelphia, PA (pictured)

TENNESSEE
Thomas Hughes' Kingston Lisle - Rugby, TN

VERMONT
Rowland Evans Robinson's Rokeby Museum - Ferrisburg, VT

VIRGINIA
Edgar Allan Poe Museum - Richmond, VA
Anne Spencer House - Lynchberg, VA

WEST VIRGINIA
Pearl S. Buck Birthplace - Hillsboro, WV

Disney World Pick Up Lines

So, my sister-in-law sent me an e-mail in which she mentioned how several years ago she was actually able to get into Cinderella's Royal Table at Disney World. If you have no idea what I'm talking about, this is a meal where the characters visit with guests while they eat. What makes it so popular is that it's the princesses and princes who aside from being popular with the kiddies, are "face characters" meaning they don't wear masks and can therefore talk to guests. It's also the restaurant inside the castle. There are complex strategies in guide books to score a table.
Anyway, my sister-in-law remarked that when she went Cinderella's Prince (Prince Charming?) commented to her that she was so pretty he mistook her for Snow White. Some Prince, trying to pick up women while his wife was in the room. Or was he having a fling with Snow behind Cindy's back? It reminded me of the fabulous Stephen Sondheim musical Into the Woods which interweaves several classic fairy tales. The first act ends with Happily Ever After, and the second act is what comes next, including Cinderella and Rapunzel's princes philandering off to pursue Snow White and Sleeping Beauty.
Anyway, I started to think how if these princes were real, they'd likely be using these character meals to cash in on their fame and pick up attractive guests. Which led to my imagining....

The Top 10 Pick Up Lines Heard at Walt Disney World

1. "Is this your shoe? It looks like a perfect fit."

2. "Me Tarzan, you gorgeous!"

3. "You know, I'm part god."

4. "Are you a mermaid? Because you've been swimming through the ocean of my dreams all night."

5. (attempts kiss) "Oh, excuse me! I thought you were asleep because you're so beautiful."

6. "Wow! I just rubbed this lamp, made a wish, and here...you...are!"

7. "...I'm twitterpated...."

8. "I'm actually much better looking than this--let me show you how to break the spell."

9. "Was your daddy a pirate? Because someone stole the second star to the right and put it in your eyes."

10. "I'm the eighth dwarf--Sexy."

Feel free to post your own in the comments (just please keep them relatively clean).

Confessions of a Book Addict

So here it is, nearly halfway through the year, and all I've done is update my 'Latest Books Read,' 'Favorite Photo,' and 'What I'm Currently Listening To' lists, the latter of which is now outdated again. The trouble is I really don't listen to CDs anymore--I listen to individual songs thanks to the advent of the iPod.
I have been spending a lot of time on my photography, in fact I just got back from an impromptu trip to Huntsville, Alabama. A photographer at a photo safari session at the Nashville Zoo last weekend recommended the butterfly garden there. I was rather disappointed that though they had a large exhibit, I only saw three very common species--Monarch, Zebra Longwing, and Julia. It was still a nice getaway. The people there were very friendly, more saying "hello" as we passed than not.
I went to a popular outdoor mall to find dinner, but being a holiday weekend everywhere had a long line, so I ended up having a sandwich at the Starbucks in Barnes & Noble. Of course, I couldn't go to a bookstore and leave empty handed, I I must give myself credit for putting back two of the three books I was going to buy and settling on Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451, which I never read in school. I finished it last night, which put me back on track with my 52-book quota.
Last year I had a goal to read 52 books (a book a week) but didn't quite make it because I changed the rules in November to not counting books I didn't finish. This year I'm on target, with twenty books to date. If I counted the books I didn't finish, I'd be at thirty. Partly, I'm doing it because it inspires me to spend more time reading and less time channel surfing. But I also have a more practical issue. I've run out of bookshelf space and space for more bookshelves.
When I moved from New York, I remember the guy who came to give me an estimate. I'd already started packing, and he looked at the neat stacks of small but numerous boxes.
"What's in all those?"
"Books."
"All of 'em?"
"I like to read." He glanced at the six-foot bookcase with doubled rows, not an inch between the spines.
"I've only had time to pack the mass markets," I commented. He looked over to where a mirrored curio shelf I'd picked up at the antique store down the street had been commandeered to hold history and etiquette books.
"You know, it's going to cost you a fortune to move all these books." He eyed the double glass-doored cabinet from Ikea full of hardcovers and over sized art books that towered above his height.
"A lot of those are signed," I said.
He grunted dubiously.
"But these are all the books," I said confidently, thinking he was overreacting. There weren't that many, and I'd limited them to the living room. The whole apartment was only 500 square feet, so the quantity just seemed a lot relative to the small space. I once stayed at an apartment in the city where you couldn't see the color of the walls for the bookshelves. Every room--the bathroom, the kitchen, above the door frames--was nothing but bookshelves. It was book-lover heaven!
He moved into the kitchen and began to poke around in the cabinets. Food, dishes, glasses, an entire cabinet full of cookbooks over the fridge. I don't cook much, but I always mean to learn. He shook his head.
"Oh, right, forgot those were there," I said, chagrined.
He went into the bedroom. Seven or so books mocked me from the nightstand. Well, those obviously didn't count, those were the books I was in the middle of reading. Those would go in the car with me. He opened the cabinet built into the dresser. Sweaters shelf, sweater shelf, music book shelf, music book shelf. Well, the stereo was in the bedroom, and it's not like I had room for a piano. His critical eyes slid across the line of dictionary, reference, and writing books lined up on the top shelf of my desk above my computer.
"Those are for work," I noted.
He opened the closet. Work clothes, shoes...a plastic crate on its side full of books too tall for the shelves.
He sighed. "You're really going to pay a fortune to move all of these. You need to get rid of at least half of them."
Get rid of half my books? Was he crazy?
"But I already did. I got rid of as many as I could." I had lugged several boxes off a few weeks before to donate to the church fair booksale. Of course, I worked the book sale and ended up bringing some home, but not as many as I gave.
"At least half," he repeated.
As he left, I mentally ran through the shelves. What else could I get rid of? The books I had worked on as an editorial assistant and associate editor, some of which had my name in the acknowledgments? The classics I fell in love with and the museum art books I'd bought as souvenirs and I'd carried home from a summer in Spain, paying for a third suitcase for the purpose. The complete works of Hemingway, Wharton, and Fitzgerald I'd accumulated during an internship at Simon & Schuster, and the collections in progress of other classic authors. The library of mysteries and romances in mass market already culled and boxed that I used to study the genres for work. The cookbooks, and history, reference and biography. Books that were recommended, books that were gifts, books that sparked my interest in a store, at a library sale, on the giveaway shelf at work. There were no more I could part with. I didn't care how much it cost.
Desperate, I called my good friend Kristine, a fellow book lover and the only person I know who can outlast me at a bookstore.
"Why don't we stop for hot chocolate now?" I asked her once, after we'd been browsing for over an hour.
"But we haven't even gotten to history and biography yet," she replied, soldiering on. Kristine is as big a book collector as I am, a lawyer turned high school teacher, she's one of the smartest and most educated people I know with a constant thirst for knowledge. Kristine will browse the bargain section, picking up any book that catches her interest, reading the copy and skimming the first few pages, and issuing a verdict. She inspired me to read more broadly, not just in my favorite genres. She was, of course, completely sympathetic as I explained what the literaphobic moving guy had said.
"There's an underfunded school I know of," she said. "The library doesn't have any money for new books, and the librarians are desperate for donations."
Kristine came over the following weekend with her jeep to help me weed the shelves again. I picked up each book and asked myself three questions.
"Can I visualize myself reading this book in the next two years? Does this copy have sentimental value? Would I be unable to easily find another copy?" If the answer to all three questions was no, it went in the donation pile. Many of the classics went--it's easy to find those and I never get around them--they require time to think, absorb, and savor that I just don't have. A lot of the nonfiction went. A fair amount of literary fiction too by authors I hadn't had a chance to learn to like. It was easier to think that instead of collecting dust on my shelves, these books would be read and loved by others. That a teen might discover a passion for a subject, or author, or just reading in general from one of these copies. Books are meant to be read, they're not decor despite what the magazines might suggest.
We ended up filling Kristine's jeep with boxes of books, and in exchange for her help she had her pick of the litter and set aside a stack of those that interested her, or that she could use for her own class.
It still cost me a relative fortune to move, but when I arrived in Tennessee I had glorious shelf space to fill again--and an apartment twice the size of the old one. Ah, the freedom to accumulate new books! Within two years I had run out of space again. Now I have shelves of children's books for when my nephew visits, and a shelf of memoir and a shelf of travel essays--two of my latest favorite genres.
And so began the goal to read as many as I could, and donate those I read and wouldn't read again to make room for more. I tried making a rule that for every five books I got rid of, I could buy one new book. The next day I bought five without getting rid of one. If books were harmful, there would probably be a support group for people like me. But since they're as good for you as exercise and vegetables, I guess I'll have to suffer in contentment. And get back to reading--I just pulled a new book off the shelf.

Traffic Etiquette

Okay, I admit, this is going to be a bit of a rant, but I think it's one you'll want to rant along with me. Along with the festive holiday season, there is always festive holiday traffic, and it seems to bring out the worst in drivers despite the spirit of the season. Compound the holiday rush with icy roads and traffic-snarling accidents caused by the combination of the two, and you begin to understand why people suffer from road rage. Embracing my newly recognized Southerness, I am trying to embrace a zen-like acceptance as I sit staring at the same taillights, listening to favorite songs that are beginning to get old on my iPod. Zen is not an easy state to achieve, though. And I blame Sparky, Righty, Speedy, and Scavenger.
If we could all just accept that we're in this together, apply the golden rule, and be patient I think never ending traffic would not just be more tolerable, but there would be a little less of it. But what really irritates me is when you try to do unto others, only to find still others taking advantage--namely the aforementioned four. I know you know them, but let me be polite and introduce you properly as we review four breaches of traffic etiquette.
1. Blocking the Box - So, you're crawling along, a car length every three minutes, and finally can glimpse the anticipated traffic light where you plan to take a right onto the main road. There are maybe five cars ahead of you and you watchi in anticipation as the light turns green. But you don't move. Okay, you think, it takes a moment to clear the intersection. A minute goes by, you crane your neck, still no movement. Now it's yellow. Not even a little roll forward. And it's red again, and you at last inch half a car length forward. Repeat sequence. Repeat again. Now there's just two cars in front of you and you can see what's happening. The oncoming traffic is crawling along. Their light turns yellow, they keep moving despite the fact that the traffic ahead has stopped. Their light turns red with one car blocking half the intersection, stuck at the end of a frozen line of cars stretching as far as the eye can see. Now Sparky at the light to your left decides she has waited long enough and if she can get over that thick white line right after the light turns, she hasn't gone through it. Sparky couldn't possibly slam on the brakes at half a mile an hour on these icy roads. So she moves into the intersection, completing the wall of cars running perpendicularly to you. Naturally, the carefully timed lights all along your destination road have turned red. So there you are, at your green light with nowhere to go. The light turns yellow, and the frustrated car two ahead of you rolls halfway into the intersection. As your light turns red, Sparky rolls merrily forward, and your leader crams herself behind. One small victory for your road. Now you know why it has taken 20 minutes to go 1/4 of a mile. Etiquette Lesson: If there is not a physical space for your car on the other side of the intersection, you wait at the light, whether it is green, yellow, red, or purple! In New York city, it's a law--should be national.

2. Taking Turns - So, while you're waiting at the interminable light, a car coming along the blissfully clear opposite lane stops and indicates that he would like to take a left turn in front of you to the cross street street to your right. Being a polite driver, and having no rush to speed along the whopping (but hard-earned) two car lengths between you and the bumper you've been staring at, you press down on the brake, smile at Lefty, and wave him across. He gives a grateful wave, and scoots happily by you. You feel a little good that at least someone is getting somewhere. But you weren't paying attention to Righty, the car to your right who has now wedged his car into the line ahead of you as Lefty was making his move. Well, you think, looking at the two Rightys behind him, taking turns is reasonable, even if I've been waiting twenty minutes, and he's been waiting two. But wait, what's this? Righty #2 is tailgating, shoving into line right behind Righty #1. It's a fundamental traffic rule of etiquette--every other car. If everyone observes this, it all works more efficiently.

3. The Merging Lane - So, at last you have made it to the main road and reached the pinnacle of the traffic snarl--the highway exit ramp where four lanes of cars have come to a near standstill, and about half seem to have given up and are abandoning the fast lane for your lane. You eventually find yourself next to the merging lane, and following the taking turns rule, you allow the car nearest you in front. You creep forward, and creep forward some more. Maybe you even let a second car in. You've all sped up to a relatively rapid two miles an hour now. Though the lane to your right is oh-so-temptingly clear, you know that lane ends ahead. At least you're finally moving. But wait--you've stopped again. You're waiting. Waiting. Still not moving. Waiting. Flipping the radio station. Waiting. Watching the guy in the car next to you--is he talking to himself, or does he have one of those little earpieces? Waiting.... And then along comes Speedy. Speedy is briskly rolling along that clear merging lane to your right. He is going to get as far along as possible before indicating, while all his fellow highwaymen (and -women) have politely merged as soon as possible to share your lot. You do not want to let Speedy in. Speedy should have to sit and wait as long as it takes you (and everyone else) to get to that point. Say, about ten minutes. If it weren't for Speedy and his brethren, it would only take you five minutes to get to where he is. Speddy stole your consistent two-mile-an-hour pace! "Don't let him in!" you yell (as the guy beside you tries to figure out if you're talking to yourself, or on one of those earpiece things). But, of course, Good Samaritan is twenty car lengths ahead and can't hear you. He lets Speedy in almost immediately. So you bare your teeth as the Speedys zip past. Traffic etiquette rule #3: just because the lane is clear, doesn't mean you should use it to the inconvenience of dozens of others.

4. Parking Space Lotto - So, you've made it to the mall parking garage at last, and find yourself scanning for shoppers heading for their cars. But, of course, there are parking predators everywhere, and you soon find yourself slowly easing along behind two other cars. At least there's only one lane up, and one lane down, so all you have to do is bide your time, and keep easing into the bowels of the garage. The third free space will be mine, you think. That's not so bad, after all the traffic. Car #1 gets lucky, and spots a a pair of taillights just as she's about to pass. She slams on her brakes, backs up immediately without looking, then indicates to claim her territory. You stop, glance in the rearview at the line of cars behind you who luckily didn't rear end you, and wait patiently as the shopper backs efficiently out of the space so Car #1 can park. Now I'm second in line, you think gleefully. I've almost made it! Not only that, but while you were waiting, another shopper has returned to her car, kids in tow, and Car #2 (just in front of you) moves briskly forward and flips on his blinker. The Mom puts the bags away, secures the kids in the backseat, returns to the trunk for something, digs lint out of her purse for awhile. You sigh, but take solace in the fact that the next space is yours. I'm next! Mom finally climbs into the driver's seat, but still doesn't move (you speculate she's picking a radio station, and maybe touching up her driving make-up). But in the darkness you see a glimmer of good news--taillights! Beckoning to you. That's my space! And it's right near the elevators! What luck! But wait...all of a sudden a car is passing on your left! One of the cars behind you has pulled around and plans to claim your space. And there is nothing you can do. Mom is backing up and slams on her brakes as Scavenger drives past, swerves around the oncoming car that has just left your space, and slides neatly in. Mom starts backing again, more cautiously. But Scavenger is a trendsetter, and now another car is passing. Then another. Finally, Mom gets out of the space, car #2 gets into it. You are next again, but there is no joy in it. The Scavengers shoved you down the list, usurping what was rightfully yours. Final traffic etiquette rule for today: you are not the only one waiting, your needs are not greater than anyone else's--wait your turn!

I'm only listing four because these are all things that happened to me in the last four days. Feel free to vent your own traffic etiquette faux pas experiences in the Comments, though. It is therapeutic!

I Think I'm Becoming Southern

I grew up in New England--Connecticut to be precise. You really don't get much more Yankee than that. Sure, I had a few Southern tendencies--I like iced tea with lots of sugar, but I always drank it the Northern way, sucking up the undissolved granules from the bottom of the glass with a straw. I didn't know such a thing as "sweet tea" existed until I came to Tennessee for college.

In addition to opening my eyes to the idea of sweetening tea while it's hot, and then adding the ice so the sugar is melted in, I picked up the handy second person plural. After all, I studied Spanish which has not one but two tenses, ustedes for formal and vosotros for informal. The closest Yankee English has is the sexist you guys and I suppose you could argue that the phrase you all is the ustedes of English. But, as we all know, the Southerners have y'all.

I took this phrase with me when I left the South for my first job in New York. I also brought a stack of country music CDs (mostly Reba McEntire). Back up North, I resigned myself to once again adding sugar packets to iced tea (you know you've crossed from South to North when you order a "sweet tea" and the waitress replies, "Well...we have iced tea. And sugar.")

Being in the college bubble, I did not absorb nearly as much Southern culture as I have since I moved back to Tennessee about four years ago. I realized it last week when a new coworker was telling an anecdote about a friend, and commented, "He doesn't have nearly as strong a Southern accent as I do." I was surprised to realize I hadn't noticed my coworker had an accent at all. My eyes are open to all the ways I have become Southern. When I first moved from New York, I couldn't bring myself to go to the local deli, because when I ordered:
"ARoastBeefOnWhiteWithLettuceTomatoMustardOnionsNoMayo" they didn't start throwing it together before I got to Tomato. Instead, the man behind the counter would wait a moment, and then say,
"What kind of bread?"
"White. Roast beef, lettuce, tomato, onions, mustard."
"Wait, roast beef....what do you want on it?"
Having spent six years spoiled by New York delis, it all seemed agonizingly slow. But now, I go to that same deli once a week and enjoy the calm pace.

Instead of studiously ignoring the lady idly chitchatting with the waitress while we both waited for our take-out orders at the Chinese restaurant this evening, I struck up a conversation about Oprah's weight, and why kitchens are bigger and more open than they used to be.

I like to eat barbecue--I even ate my pork barbecue sandwich today despite the fact that they left off the sauce and added cole slaw. I also know that's a regional difference (though I'm not Southern enough yet to know what regions).

When I arrived at work this morning I saw a man crossing the lobby in plaid pants, and my internal voice said, "Now that's just not right, right there." Putting aside the fact that Yankees don't generally wear plaid pants unless they're golfing (and there aren't many golf courses in midtown Manhattan), I tried to dismiss this sign, blaming it on the fact that I was listening to a Lewis Grizzard comedy routine on my commute in. Then I realized--I was listening to Lewis Grizzard. I was even laughing as he made jokes at the expense of Yankees and Georgia football!

Football. I've actually started watching this season, since my alma mater started winning. I actually care what's going on, and yell at the screen when I watch it on TV. I also have knowledge that I probably don't need. I know why restrictor plates are controversial in NASCAR. I can name most of the current members of the Grand Ole Opry--as well as many of those who aren't current (and I have most of them on my iPod). I know cornbread dressing is not something you put on salad. I eat at meat-and-threes.

And I still drink sweet tea pretty much daily--I guess I haven't changed that much.

Music Album Memories

I was at the main library last week, browsing through the music collection when I came across a CD that was familiar, though I never knew it existed. When I was young I remember very little of the flight to Australia to visit my relatives other than that I apparently didn't have a Walkman and so was forced to select from the channels offered by the airline, plugging those horrid ear clamps with the little foam plugs on the ends. There was only one channel of interest to an eight-year-old girl, and it featured a selection of current pop hits. I listened to the same ten songs over and over and over, for hour after hour. Back then the whole trip, along with layovers, took something like forty-eight hours door to door. We flew from New York to LA, and from there to Sydney with a fuel stop in Fiji, then on a small plane to Wagga Wagga (which is just fun to say) and then it was another two hours by car to the small town where my Nana lived, and an hour beyond that to the family Sheep Station. It was that long leg from the US to Australia that these songs were burned into my memory. I don't think it's odd for a song to bring back memories, but it was this specific collection.
As you may have guessed, last week I found it: Billboard Top Hits 1983. I fell in love with Bonnie Tyler's "Total Eclipse of the Heart," "Down Under" by Men at Work is probably why they selected this collection. I remember "Making Love Out of Nothing at All" by Air Supply, "Do You Really Want to Hurt Me" by Culture Club, "Electric Avenue" by Eddy Grant, "Africa" by Toto, "Maniac" by Michael Sembello, "Stray Cat Strut" by Stray Cats...but here's the odd thing. There's one song, "Jeopardy" by Greg Kihn Band that I have absolutely no memory of. All the others are so memorable. I also vaguely remember discovering an Australian singer named Jason Donovan, and I think it was also on the plane playlist. Maybe they replaced "Jeopardy" with one of his songs?
Anyway, it got me to thinking of the albums that I connect with certain fond memories. En Vogue's "Funky Divas" was the first tape I played in my first car, a gun mental gray Oldsmobile Cutlass Supreme with a dent down one side--I added a matching dent to the other side when I drove too close to a low stone wall a month after I got my license. It was the first time I drove with my friends in the car (my parents were right to make me wait to drive with anyone else, though apparently I should have waited longer). The Reality Bites soundtrack tape on a cheap Walkman entertained me on the plane ride to and from Peru when I was in college (Lisa Loeb's "Stay" was my favorite track). Then there was the Original Cast Album of Titanic, The Musical that I blasted on the new sound system of my first new car, a 1997 Honda Accord. I think I might have to use it again for testing out sound systems when I shop for my next car, both for nostalgia and because there's great range in some of the songs. Some albums just shine on a great sound system for some reason, and though this isn't one of my particular favorites in general, it serves this purpose.
As I thought over the memorable albums, I realized they all came at the beginning of a new experience or journey, and all had to do with travel. Some books are like that as well, though are usually part of the journey. I remember, when I spent a summer studying in Spain, stumbling upon a drugstore in Madrid selling Penguin Classics just when I was starved for a fresh book in my native tongue. I devoured Rudyard Kipling's Kim while fielding questions from my baffled roommate, an Econ major from Texas, with monosyllabic responses: "So, you don't have to read that." "No." "It's not for class?" "No." "But it's a classic?" "Yes." "But you don't have to read it." "No." "So, why are you?" "Because it's good." "But it's a classic." "Yes." I swear, we had this same exchange at least a dozen times as I discovered other favorites: plays by Oscar Wilde, and Anthony Trollope's Lady Anna being the most memorable. That was also the summer I read my first romance novel, Surrender My Love by Johanna Lindsey, which was left by a previous boarder--I'd never finished a book that thick that fast, and I couldn't put it down. Two summers and many romances later I would read Once and Always in England just after graduating college, and within a month of returning I'd land my first job working with its author, Judith McNaught, as an editorial assistant to a romance editor. All those years studying classics, only to find I should have been reading romance to prepare for my career!
Memory is a funny thing. I can't help but wonder what books and albums will capture a period or a change in my life next....