And don’t take the national media’s bias toward an area too literally. Most of those people think the world ends fifty miles on either side of the New York – Washington corridor or any area outside of southern California. When doing news reports from other parts of the country, they just keep repeating the same ole clichés. If you’re dependent on the media to establish your opinions, you probably think that:
Everybody in Florida is over sixty five and lives in the “Villages” or they speak Spanish and are illegal aliens.
Everybody in Florida is over sixty five and lives in the “Villages” or they speak Spanish and are illegal aliens.
People in Texas drive pickup trucks, wear oversized belt buckles and have over-inflated opinions of themselves.
People in Minnesota all speak Norwegian and live to be a hundred.
People in Minnesota all speak Norwegian and live to be a hundred.
Everybody in the Midwest raises pigs and wears caps from the local feed store (even the women).
All white southerners have a neatly pressed white robe & hood in their closet and all black southerners live in cold water shacks on the plantation.
People in Appalachia marry their cousins and measure their social status by their number of original teeth.
I’ve found that when you take the opportunity to get to know them, people are pretty much the same everywhere; good, bad and indifferent. But there is one thing that is unique in every community; something that gives an area its own special flavor.
Different parts of the country have distinctive odors.
I notice this because I have a highly developed sense of smell and my memories are often triggered by it – be it a perfume that was worn by my wife in her younger days or an old tarpaulin we used for camping when I was a kid. As I travel, the first thing I notice is not the countryside or the architecture but what odor is wafting through my car window.
We’re pretty lucky here in our community. We smell like fresh cut pine lumber with just an occasional whiff of wet dirt in the Spring and Summer. Other areas are not so fortunate. We lived in the beautiful city of Natchez for a time. Back then it had two distinct aromas, both of which are more prevalent in the heat of the summer. The rotten egg smell of the papermill south of town mixed with the musty odor of old homes slowly decaying in a humid climate.
The Gulf Coast smells like dead fish and diesel fuel at times, Jackson smells like car exhaust mingled with expensive perfume from all those counter girls spraying their atomizers in the McRae’s or Dillard’s in the malls.
Other parts of the world are distinctive, too. Canada doesn’t smell at all because there’s nothing up there, Ohio smells like, well- Ohio. New Orleans has a smell that is indescribable. Try walking down Bourbon Street right after Mardi Gras and you will understand what I am talking about.
But if you live in an area long enough, soon you don’t notice it or you even come to like its smell. I spent many years in rural Western Kansas. Every community has at least one cattle feed lot located north or east of town. When the heat of summer comes along and the wind is just right, the smell of manure and rotten feed permeates everything – your clothes, hair and homes. When I first moved out there, I asked an old timer how people were able to stand the smell. He just tipped the cowboy hat back on his head and smiled from behind the wheel of his Cadillac. “Son,” He said, “That ain’t no stink. That’s just the smell of money.”
All white southerners have a neatly pressed white robe & hood in their closet and all black southerners live in cold water shacks on the plantation.
People in Appalachia marry their cousins and measure their social status by their number of original teeth.
I’ve found that when you take the opportunity to get to know them, people are pretty much the same everywhere; good, bad and indifferent. But there is one thing that is unique in every community; something that gives an area its own special flavor.
Different parts of the country have distinctive odors.
I notice this because I have a highly developed sense of smell and my memories are often triggered by it – be it a perfume that was worn by my wife in her younger days or an old tarpaulin we used for camping when I was a kid. As I travel, the first thing I notice is not the countryside or the architecture but what odor is wafting through my car window.
We’re pretty lucky here in our community. We smell like fresh cut pine lumber with just an occasional whiff of wet dirt in the Spring and Summer. Other areas are not so fortunate. We lived in the beautiful city of Natchez for a time. Back then it had two distinct aromas, both of which are more prevalent in the heat of the summer. The rotten egg smell of the papermill south of town mixed with the musty odor of old homes slowly decaying in a humid climate.
The Gulf Coast smells like dead fish and diesel fuel at times, Jackson smells like car exhaust mingled with expensive perfume from all those counter girls spraying their atomizers in the McRae’s or Dillard’s in the malls.
Other parts of the world are distinctive, too. Canada doesn’t smell at all because there’s nothing up there, Ohio smells like, well- Ohio. New Orleans has a smell that is indescribable. Try walking down Bourbon Street right after Mardi Gras and you will understand what I am talking about.
But if you live in an area long enough, soon you don’t notice it or you even come to like its smell. I spent many years in rural Western Kansas. Every community has at least one cattle feed lot located north or east of town. When the heat of summer comes along and the wind is just right, the smell of manure and rotten feed permeates everything – your clothes, hair and homes. When I first moved out there, I asked an old timer how people were able to stand the smell. He just tipped the cowboy hat back on his head and smiled from behind the wheel of his Cadillac. “Son,” He said, “That ain’t no stink. That’s just the smell of money.”
