Where Is The South?

During this weekend celebrating "Juneteenth" in Texas I was reminded of recent changes in the American mindset regarding what is currently considered the American South versus how large the South really is. I was recently amazed at how contemporary opinion can absolutely rewrite history. It happens regularly and many in the conversation either don't know any better or choose not to contradict the speaker, especially if the setting happens to be the speaker's home. Being polite is one thing, allowing revisionist blowharding to be accepted as truth is quite another.

On the way to a business conference in Florida while driving the rental away from the airport my colleagues and I were talking about various parts of the country and what it must be like to live there. We talked about the South, the "Deep South" and the Southwest, going over their similarities as well as some key differences from one region to the next. Somehow the subject came up regarding Maryland and Delaware and their place in the American South.

"They're not in the South" one of my more loudmouth co-workers unequivocally proclaimed. I politely pointed out that they were considered Border States during the Civil War and were prevented from actively participating in the conflict; their inclusion would have completely surrounded Washington, D.C. with Confederate States, an untenable and unacceptable position for the seat of the federal government. That's all well and good my highly opinionated peer said dismissively but that still didn't place either state in the "real" South. Even the truth that the Mason-Dixon Line ran along the Pennsylvania-Maryland border wasn't enough in their minds to be considered a part of the South. The Mason-Dixon Line has been reduced to an historical technicality.

At a recent Memorial Day party a similar conversation took place only this time regarding my home state, the great State of Texas. We were discussing traveling for family reunions and I mentioned that my mother's family was in the "Deep South" of rural Virginia. While not as far south geographically as Alabama, Mississippi and southern Georgia the mindset of the "Deep South" permeated this part of Virginia and the Carolinas as much as anywhere else. In that mix of opinions came Texas' place in the South.

"Texas is not in the South" came the last-word opinion of the party's host. After allowing myself time to collect my thoughts and continue my argument I stated that Texas was indeed in the South and that the traditional feel and mindset of the American South could be found alive and well in the eastern part of the state. The Talladega Forest region that extends in to Texas from Arkansas and Louisiana as deep in to the state as the Tyler-Lufkin-Nacogdoches line was as southern as any part of Tennessee could ever be. El Paso not so much, perhaps, but all along US Highway 59 as far as Houston the traditional "South" can be found. Anybody remember James Byrd, Jr. of Jasper?

I guess in their crude way I am supposed to go along with the argument that times change and that feelings and basic instincts evolve, etc. Those were different times and, indeed, Northern Virginia around Washington, D.C. is a whole other country compared to any part of the state from Richmond and Charlottesville south. At the same time, Texas is simply too large to be part of any one region geo-politically. El Paso is famously closer to Los Angeles than it is to Houston while Amarillo is barely connected to the coastal culture of Corpus Christi. I still held the final trump card in the debate as far as I was concerned.

Juneteenth is the celebration of the coming of Emancipation to the State of Texas in 1865, two and a half years after Lincoln's initial declaration. Now celebrated in 37 states across the Union, it was first celebrated in Texas which, like Delaware and Maryland, was a slave-owning state, plantations included. To any Black American breathing, that puts all three states squarely in the South. Happy Juneteenth.

Gotta go.

The Lost and Winding Road

Mine was one of the last high school graduating classes in the State of Maryland to take Driver’s Education in the school system. I cringe at the memory of actually liking the Chrysler LeBaron we used for class and wanting to actually own one but that’s another story. I took my driving test in my Dad’s El Dorado which barely fit in the parallel parking slot used for the test but I did pass the first go round and proceeded to dream of wandering roads and other long journeys into the horizon with my newfound freedom. Maryland at the time was blessed with its share of highways and major boulevards but also had a fair measure of winding two-lane country roads. Those were the ones I loved the most!

I felt that I literally and figuratively got up to speed in terms of getting to know the handling characteristics of the family car but also the driving patterns and habits of other drivers around me. What I chose as my personal training platform were the kinds of country roads that most other people avoid even in good weather. What better way to really get to know how a car handles and how I respond to the existing conditions than on roads that twist, wind and cut back with frequent, sudden and unexpected regularity. Call it a very suburban version of running the Grand Prix if you will but I found experiences like that to be educational as well as exciting.

One of my favorites was Maryland #450 leading in to the state capitol of Annapolis. Parts of it traveled along a small river but the more challenging stretches ran up hill and down dale through woods and past colonial farm houses and churches right at the edge of the asphalt. Another was Maryland #32 that my mother expressly forbade me to drive on by myself until she felt I had gained more experience. Trees that probably witnessed the march of Washington grew tall and thick just inches past the yellow safety line. Car killers these trees were and surely each one had stories to tell. Like any headstrong teenager with keys to the car I drove it anyway and, thankfully, never had to explain any damage to me or the car for being over there.

Both of these roads have been significantly “straightened” now thanks to urban development and possibly one too many needless accidents. The new #32 is now a four-lane divided highway powering through Howard and Anne Arundel Counties, carrying commuters back and forth between Columbia, Ft. Meade and Annapolis but the old one still runs right beside it, an old favorite for some locals and traffic relief when the new highway gets locked up with rush hour commuters.

I still look for roads like this every now and then to “keep my skills fresh” but feel they are all ultimately going the way of the dinosaur. In a way this is a good thing as tragedies on roads like these are most often of the avoidable kind. My graduating class lost 8 classmates in one night on a local country road near Odenton, Maryland. The driver of their pick-up was drunk, he allegedly swerved to miss an oncoming car and slammed straight in to a car killer, ejecting many of the kids riding in back on to the road and into the branches, impaling one and embedding the watch of another into the tree trunk.

That was over 30 years ago. I think of that group of kids every time I return to the area. The back roads I used to love are slowly being straightened and they take too much time to remember, find and drive during brief visits with the family. Still, there is one left that works for my family and I. It’s not so bad but time is not on its side for much longer. The McMansions carving up the horse country beside it are seeing to that.

Gotta go.

Hello, Baltimore

I used to live in Baltimore. Heck, I used to live in a lot of places but those are other stories. Three times over the course of my life have I called this city and surrounding area "home." As a toddler in the late 60s I watched my older sister delight in frogging the stream that ran through our backyard. During high school I went through platform shoes, afros and silk shirts in the late 70s and early 80s. Finally, as a full grown adult in the aftermath of a major national crisis, I struggled to survive and redefine myself as a professional and human being in the early 2000s. Good or bad, Baltimore, affectionately off-kilter "Balmer," has always been there.

Founded in 1729 by Cecil Calvert, Lord Baltimore of the Irish House of Lords, for three months from 1776 to 1777 it was the capital of the United States! Most Americans will recall that the Star Spangled Banner were written here by Francis Scott Key after witnessing the failed British attack on Ft. McHenry during the Battle of Baltimore in 1814. The city has seen a few facelifts since then, including the Great Fire of 1906 and some notable riots spanning 1861 during the Civil War to 1968 when Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated. Though we lived just south of the city on Ft. Meade at the time my mother would not let her children out of the house for a few days that week. In almost lock step with blood and blight, however, there always seems to have been one savior after another coming over the horizon to reinvent the city, repaint the landscape and, most especially, revitalize the Inner Harbor.

Before moving to Chicago Oprah Winfrey anchored the evening news on WJZ-TV but the city's art scene has always been way left of center. Fells Point has long been a neighborhood of activism going back to Frederick Douglass. Tallulah Bankhead held court at select watering holes in town while Jada Pinkett-Smith ("The Nutty Professor"), John Waters ("Hairspray") and Barry Levinson ("Diner" and "Rainman") hail from the city. Hollywood got in to the act once via "Hot L Baltimore," a sitcom around a flophouse hotel starring James Cromwell, Conchata Ferrell, Richard Masur and Charlotte Rae.

Former Mayor William Donald Shaeffer is revered still as the contemporary equivalent of Lord Baltimore himself over 20 years after his last year in office.

Among too many achievements to list here, he presided over the creation of Harbor Place, which included the innovative National Aquarium and the new Ballpark at Camden Yards for the woebegone yet beloved Orioles. Most notably for the people of the city, he and City Commissioner Robert Embry offered what I call "The Dollar Deal" where anybody could buy any abandoned row house in select parts of the city for one dollar. The stipulation was to personally invest a minimum of $100,000 in renovations as a way to jumpstart the decayed inner city.

It reversed the population decline, beautified the city and gave a much needed boost to personal equity and city coffers in one fell swoop. Key note here: not a single city backed loan defaulted!

I am not from Baltimore but it is the closest thing to a family home that I have. Thanks to "The Wire" it doesn't always look its best and is indeed facing major challenges today but it is essentially the same city most people would recognize and that I remember from years ago. It is at once a little touchy in the underdog kind of way when mentioned in the same conversation as nearby Washington D.C. or Philadelphia; a little quirky in its love of Old Bay Seasoning on everything from its world famous blue crabs to ice cream and is justifiably proud of its place in American national and sports history - Pimlico hosts the Preakness the first Monday of every May, a part of the Triple Crown.

A lot of heavy industry is gone but the Bromo Tower, those famous marble steps and the people are still there, dancing to their own rhythm on the west side of the Chesapeake. Go for crabs, ballgames, fresh produce at one of six neighborhood markets or any of over 100 bars and pubs in Fells Point but don't expect to see too many beehive hair-dos!

Gotta go!

Oriole Optimism

Oriole Park at Camden Yards opened in 1992 as part of a master plan for Baltimore and set a new standard in baseball stadiums across the country, most flatteringly imitated brick by brick in Arlington, Texas. Camden Yards, the original and still the best of the bunch, features a glorious promenade at the edge of right field boasting concessions of local foods and team merchandise the likes of which had never been seen before. Out in the open air, wide walkways contribute to a party atmosphere that blends in with the environment of the game itself.

Where football games are most often best viewed at home baseball games are the ones to watch at the stadium itself under gorgeous skies, mild temperatures and relaxed energy all around. Baltimore delivered with a spring day right out of central casting. Not a cloud in the sky, maybe 72 degrees and the early season hopes of a city in love with its team, win or lose. Hope springs eternal and this April day was charged with drink and dreams as the O's and rival RedSox took the field.

There was reason for the O's faithful to be filled with hope and desire this day. The Orioles typically come out swinging early in the season, at or near the top of the division standings but not this year. Sadly, the 2010 season is thus far dead on arrival, the team in last place and standing double digits in games out of the lead. We were going nowhere fast and facing a season barely started but already over. In to this heady mixture of cheerful weather, pride and trepidation comes Boston, not too far removed from their first world championship but also not doing much better in this season's scheme of things. We wanted blood.

Up two to nothing in only the first inning we wanted to scream and shout but nine innings can take a long, long time to play. Like our cousins the Chicago Cubs we sat back and waited for the inevitable lead to fritter away in bad defense and generous pitching. Two to one, then three to one, the O's teased the Red Sox until the 8th inning when, tied at 3-3, Boston slammed a go ahead home run to make it 4-3. Some but not all started heading for the exits after the count was two outs and the first two strikes coming in quick order.

Third Baseman MiguelTejada was at bat, however, and everyone, including a stadium uncomfortably full of traveling "BoSox" fans were on their feet waiting for the last pitch. Crack! ROAR! A single homer to tie the game. Oh heaven above please let the defense hold through the ninth. Both sides had been praying because the ninth went scoreless and in to the tenth we went.

Only Boston forgot to keep praying. They went three and out, then allowed two Orioles on first and second base before Tejada came to the plate again. A single up the middle past the second baseman, the winning run flies around the bases and the entire city blew up in cries of elation, tears of absolution and just plain exhaustion. The O's had just dealt Boston its first losing April in recent memory and would go on to sweep the series, their first of the season. The only downside was the hour and a half it took the light rail to get us back to our car that night, a trip that normally takes less than half an hour.

It was good to be at home, at that game, in that weather and in that moment, 15 rows behind home plate, with my dad.

Gotta go.

Lovely Rita's

Anyone that doesn't have a sweet tooth I truly admire for finding a way to live without having to manage ice cream binges and other confectionary cravings. I, on the other hand, share the universal curse of being drawn to anything loaded with cane sugar or high fructose corn syrup. I never acquired a taste for honey, though: the taste and texture to me add up to little more than a sweet loogie.

But I digress. Ice cream, cookies, brownies, cakes, you name it. Sherbert is another one that I shy away from but I was surely in heaven the day I discovered pear sorbet, served as a "palate cleanser" with a little sprig of mint between courses at better restaurants. The good ol' Slurpee done gone upscale, y'all!

Through the years and over the miles there have been many enjoyable treats discovered around the world but one in particular comes to mind that for a while I believed that I would have to do without. While living in Baltimore I came across a road-side stand type of establishment with red and white awnings by the name of Rita's. They started out on the front porch of a Pennsylvania family whose father knew how to make the best frozen custard and flavored ice in the area. "You oughta go in to business," they said and voila.

Now, you can add frozen custard to the list of sweets that don't tickle my fancy as I consider it to airy for my taste but the frozen ice that was also on the menu made me a true believer with the first spoonfull. Since I have discovered this family-run chain I have enjoyed ice flavors including cherry, lemonade, mango, grape, strawberry and green apple. One outlet I used to go to a lot got in to trouble for going "off-menu" in creating some of their own concoctions, my favorite of which was "Orange Crush" but the bottom line was that for a while Rita's was my sanity check nearly every day after a hard day at the office. Oh, how the empty calories piled up to cope with the stress of working in retail.

Two years ago I moved to Texas to re-invent my professional life after long and hard deliberation and reflection. I'd be leaving my family back on the East Coast but I would also be leaving Rita's. I asked the franchisee why the chain was limited primarily to the Middle Atlantic states and he replied that company philosophy at the time felt that quality was assured only if stores could be serviced from their single distribution center in central Pennsylvania. Anything farther than a day's drive was not an option. Well, I consoled myself, I can always stop in whenever I'm back in the area.

To my sheer delight, after the move to Texas was less than a year old I discovered that someone in Rita's front office had changed their minds and decided to head west. There is a store less than 5 minutes drive from my home and, wouldn't you know it, being in Texas one of the first ice flavors they offered was sweet tea?

Gotta go!

Goin' Home

I don’t get lost, per se, when I return home to Maryland for visits, which is where I am writing from now over the 2009 holidays. I learned to drive on these streets many moons ago when driver’s ed. was still a part of the offered high school curriculum. Some new roads have been added over the ages and a few have been redirected and modified (ol’ #32 used to be a two-lane country road and is now a multi-lane thruway) but not so much that I end up on the Eastern Shore when I’m trying instead to get to Frederick.

What I do find, unlike my friends who were born and raised in the same area and have lived there all of their lives is that while the roads will always be familiar to me the names do fade away. It is the classic “I know where I’m going but couldn’t tell ya how to get there” scenario. I remember the street we lived on but have forgotten most of the roads around it. I remember the main road leading to our neighborhood but only when I see the street sign do I remember the road number. On a trip to Europe I discovered the same thing.

Some years ago I was heading to Switzerland on business and had a unique opportunity to return to the army bases around Stuttgart where I grew up during the Cold War 70s in what was then West Germany. A friend of mine was in the military at the time and stationed in Germany. He agreed to meet me at the main train station and use his military access to take us both back down memory lane.

If GPS devices were available then we certainly didn’t have one. Everything was a fuzzy but certain memory from the station to the first stop on our tour, Robinson Barracks in the middle of town and situated on a massif overlooking the heart of the city. We knew that the main road leading to “Mach’s Nicht’s Corner,” the name all military personnal called the massive six-road intersection at the bottom of the hill, was to the north leading up and away from the valley where the Hauptbahnhof sits. After some dead reckoning and dusty memories from what was then 18 years of separation Robinson Barracks was quickly found, right where we left it.

The military presence in Stuttgart today is significant but not what it was during the days of Brezhnev and N.A.T.O. vs. the Warsaw Pact. “R.B.” is now a housing base only where it was once the unquestioned hub of life for the entire valley, including offices, schools and shopping. Enough of it remained to pull many wistful memories as did the other kasernes we visited that day, Kelly Barracks, Patch Barracks and Boeblingen Kaserne. Eight years of my life were spent in Stuttgart, off and on from 18 months of age to the seasoned veteran teenager of 15. Not having a license and relying on buses and parents to get me around back in the day I’d say served my friend and I pretty well that nostalgic afternoon.

Neither of us could remember a single street name but we knew where they were in relation to each other and got turned around only once because they had re-located a highway on ramp from where I remembered it had been. Today I not only have the memories and the photos but the benefits of Google Maps as well to bring it all back.

The road leading “up the hill” to R.B. as we used to say is not as steep as we remembered it to be. What road is? The name is the same though; it is Auerbachstrasse.

Gotta go.