The Southern Way

The Southern Way has many facets; southern hospitality, unique cuisine and impeccable manners quickly come to mind. It’s easy to be charmed by southerners. Sincere warmth is their specialty.
As a Yankee with 15 years of southern living under my belt, I’ve learned to appreciate some of the subtleties of the culture. I wish I could say I’ve adopted all of them, but that would be a stretch. My friends who are Dixie natives seem to accept me as I am. They realize that I can’t really help being direct to a fault but forgive me, perhaps because sometimes my antics make them smile. They assume my heart’s in the right place and those that know me really well can vouch for my sincere love of grits.
Most intriguing about the Southern Way is the southerner’s ability to be polite under even trying circumstances. I shall never forget my first exposure to the gentle courtesies so routinely displayed in the south. It happened in my own home during a home owner’s association meeting about a year after my wife and I moved to Tennessee. We had a guest speaker. Bless his heart, the man droned on. An endless stream of words, he was a prototype for Ambien. I tried my best to be attentive. But my eyes, with a glaze worthy of a country ham, betrayed me. An hour later the guy was still talking.
It was getting late and most of us had to go to work the next morning. The association president got up and walked into my kitchen. Seizing the opportunity, I followed him. While he poured a cup of coffee, I asked him, “Steve, are we done with this guy?” He nodded. “I think so.”
“Then why don’t we kick him out of here?”
Steve smiled. “It’s your house Len.” When the meeting finally ended I asked my fellow board members if they felt that our visitor had wasted our time. They agreed.
“Why didn’t we cut him off then?” I demanded. Glances were exchanged. Finally someone spoke up. “It’s not the Southern Way, Len.” Lesson learned.
Well, maybe not completely learned. Five years later I was working for an Internet startup. I interviewed a prospect for an executive sales position. I thought he was a promising candidate so I sent him to my boss, the company’s CEO. He liked him enough to send him on to the chairman of our board. The next day I asked my boss what the chairman thought of our candidate. He said, “Well, he was neutral, about him.”
“Does that mean its okay to hire him?” I asked. The CEO gave me a funny look. If you saw that look watching a TV movie, you would easily recognize it as an event foreshadowing my imminent departure for the unemployment line. How was I supposed to know that neutral translated into “Northernese” would sound something like, “Are you out of your mind? Your candidate is completely unsuitable for the job. What were you thinking?” Bless my heart.
Even after all these years my translation skills are less than reliable. It may not be hopeless for me though. My editor Nancy was also born and raised in the north. She was a grown-up when she moved here but she thoroughly adapted to the Southern Way. As a sensitive writer (is there any other kind?) I appreciate her gentle approach to editing.
Nancy reads a draft of everything I write. When she offers praise with a sparkle in her eyes, I know it’s suitable for publication. If on the other hand, she says something like, “It’s not bad,” but busies herself with other things as she speaks, then I know I have two options. I can do a substantial re-write or delete the document and hope for a better idea. A kindred spirit to the southland, she takes the time to choose her words carefully. You might think she was born in Chelsea, Alabama rather than Chelsea, Massachusetts.
What accounts for the universal elegance of people in the in the south? I emailed my good friend Brenda, a native of a small town in east Tennessee, to ask her if she could explain the unfailing politeness of southerners. Her response was almost northern. She said, “Its genes and grits.” That gave me hope, momentarily. I’m half-way there after all. But then she added, “However, eating a lot of grits is not enough – sorry! That word sorry -which it never would have occurred to me to add- saved her reputation as a bona fide southern belle.
I wrote her a thank you note in longhand. Am I a work making progress?

Copyright 2009 Len Serafino. All rights reserved.