Howdy. My name is Curtis (Curt to my friends) and I’m just a regular person who lives in the South. Being from the South, I tend to try to live life a little slowly. However, working in the world of IT, life sometimes moves at megabits per second and it’s hard to keep up. But I try. If you want to know more about me, just click on the “About” button just above my blog title.
Welcome to my little portal to the South. What is the South like anyway? Well, it depends on who you ask, but since I’m the one writing here I’ll tell you what it is to me.
There are two Souths – the New South and the Old South. Never having lived in the New South, I don’t know what it’s like to live there, but I’ve spent some time in it so I know sort of what it’s like. You have Atlanta with the CNN Center, the Braves and the Falcons, Centennial Olympic Park, skyscrapers reaching for the heavens, and Peachtree Street, Peachtree Drive, Peachtree Lane, and Peachtree Place. No matter which way you head, you are going to end up on Peachtree. You have Charlotte, the financial center of the nation, the Panthers and the Bobcats, the center of NASCAR and a smaller, yet no less impressive set of sky-reaching buildings. Life moves as fast as a Dale Earnhardt Chevrolet in the New South.
And then there is the Old South. This is where I live. I’ve lived in South Georgia, where the Spanish Moss sways in the breeze looking like witch’s hair against the moonlight at night. Where azaleas burst out in glory in the spring. Where football is king. Where the land is flat – you may drive down a road that is lined on both sides with pine trees and so straight you can see it disappear over the horizon. I currently live in the foothills of North Carolina close to the majestic Blue Ridge Mountains. If you’ve ever seen Dirty Dancing, then you pretty much know what it looks like where I live. The picture that heads my blog was taken at Lake Lure, one of National Geographic’s ten most beautiful man-made lakes in the world. I live in what was named the most beautiful small town in western NC.
No matter where in the South you go, people will wave to you as you drive by that you have never met. You will cut humidity in the summer with a knife. Coffee is served to you with a smile and a “hon”. Neighbors will congregate on porches to discuss… well… you name the topic, we’ll have an opinion. Whereas in other places people have dogs, in the South we have dawgs. Caviar may be a delicacy in some places, in the South it doesn’t get more exotic than a pickled peach.
A quote from the movie Field of Dreams said “Heaven is a place where dreams live.” South is my heaven. Life is definitely slower here. But I imagine a small town in the South isn’t much different than one in Indiana, or New Jersey or Idaho, except maybe they talk a little funny. In all my born days, I’ve been all over. I’ve even been to Africa. But heaven is where I want to be, so heaven is where I’ll stay.
*LOL* I always loved this one!