Authentic Mountain Culture

                                                                 “The Jamestown Flea”

Anyone who wants to experience authentic old-time mountaineer culture, should make a Saturday morning trip to the Jamestown Flea Market in Old Crazy Town. It covers about ten generous acres and on Saturday has anywhere from one hundred to four hundred vendors. My visit occurred just before Christmas, 2007. I was planning a trip back to Birmingham for the holidays, and needed to pick up a few gifts. The Flea was already hopping at eight o’clock on a frosty, forty-degree morning. I'm not exaggerating when I say that everybody-who-is-anybody from a six county area was there. Parking places in the raw, red-dirt lot were at a premium. I had to circle a bunch of times before I found a spot half a mile from the action. Black barrels with fire leaping out of them were located here and there. People stood around, warming their hands, talking loud and laughing. It was a raucous atmosphere, not unlike the tail-gate parties in Tinsel Town when Alabama and Auburn play in the Iron Bowl. In fact, as soon as I got out of my car, I smelled a familiar smoke and heard, “Sweet Home Alabama” blaring out of somebody’s car speakers. My first thought was, “Am I having a flashback?” Given the smoke-filled atmosphere, anyone who came of age in the 1960's would consider the possibility of such a thing. Take my word for it.

I brought my son, Ian, who loves to poke through other people’s trash, and his wife, Meg, who grew up with some pride, and would rather drop dead than poke. The time had come for their introduction to the shopping rituals of rural, back-woods, folks. Ian headed straight for the first stall and Meg, bless her heart, looked like she was entering one of those caves where Indiana Jones always finds snakes. I’m pretty sure she was expecting something worse than cooties to jump on her. She’s brave though. She hugged her coat around her, hunched her shoulders up, and plunged after Ian. Love will make you do dangerous things.

We saw everything from semi-automatic assault rifles and Confederate flag tee shirts--the same people were buying both--to funnel cakes and an entire Mexican food market. Old Crazy Town sports a large Latino population now. Laotian, too. The locals love them as workers, but they certainly aren't going to put “foreign food” into the Harris Teeter Supermarket. The Flea, though, that's an altogether different thing. There we found vendors selling old car parts, beanie babies, carnival glass ashtrays (in use of course), belt buckles with unmentionable words on them, sunglasses, and every sort of knife and ammunition imaginable. Mountain folks believe in arming themselves for all possibilities. One table had nothing but socks, so I bought a pair for every member of the family. They were two bucks a pop, but what the heck! I’m the generous type. We passed by two pet-shops. The puppies looked clean, healthy and frisky, but my daughter-in-law immediately began muttering about “back-yard breeders” and “puppy mills.” I guess folks from her neck of the woods send away to Russia or Bavaria for properly bred animals. I’m pretty sure most of the dogs I’ve had in my life were conceived in somebody’s back yard…or side yard…or in the street.

I saw an old boyfriend of mine. We were sweet on each other in the sixth grade when he was one of those freckle-faced, toe-headed, Huck Finn types. Cute as pie. We danced at lunch break to Johnny B. Good, and Goodness Gracious, Great Balls of Fire. He gave me a silver cross on a chain for Christmas. To look at him now, you’d never know any of that. All traces of Huck were erased, poor thing. He weighed about three-hundred pounds and looked like a gravel truck had blown up in his face. He must have thought the same about me, because he couldn’t get away fast enough. I didn’t introduce him to my children. I thought it might be too much for Meg, who was only holding on by a thread as it was.

Of all the sellers at the Jamestown Flea, the woman with the candy-apple-red and green striped hair, running the gut-slasher knife shop, got my vote for most impressive. She fit my daddy's description of “rode hard and put up wet.” Being able to talk animatedly with a cigarette hanging out the corner of your mouth is a feat of muscular dexterity I’ve always found amazing. And, the knives on her table looked like the wet-dreams of a serial killer. I’m pretty sure they weren’t for carving turkey or slicing cake. You could tell, however, that the lady knew exactly what their uses were. Personally, I was afraid to ask, being a coward and all.

Second on my list of unforgettable characters was a young, tattooed guy who’d shaved his entire head except for a long pony tail at the back. In place of hair, a rattlesnake was tattooed, coiled and ready to strike. He was cool in a weird, creepy sort of way. We ran across him in the rug shop negotiating for an area rug with a cannabis motif. Meg said, “Well, that it will undoubtedly pull his décor together nicely.”

When we left the flea, we were all a little light headed and hungry, so we headed into town for lunch. Imagine our surprise when we found all the shops closed--on a Saturday before Christmas! I guess they knew they couldn’t compete with the Jamestown Flea. Come to think of it, those shopkeepers were probably out there doing their Christmas shopping, too. I actually wouldn’t mind going back. I kind of liked that smoky air out there.

Turning of the Year

Spring in Dixie

The very best thing about living in the deep South is that Spring comes early and in earnest. Our winters are typically tepid, and then, suddenly, it's Spring. We wring every thing we possibly can out of this season simply because it is a precursor, and the sweetest inhalation before a hellishly hot summer.

In winter, there are days when we can sit on our screen porches and sip iced tea. While everyone else is shoveling snow, or stacking sandbags, we're planting pansies and praising the sun. And then comes Spring, when everything turns pink and white, the jasmine blooms along back walls, and the dogwoods unfurl their tender crosses just in time for Easter.

Such beauty is almost enough to make all the idiotic politics, and just plain mean-spirited racism, bearable for half a second. When our mayor and a City Councilman punch one another in the face downtown, we can turn our eyes to the red-buds for inspiration. 

When our governor, in all his wisdom, decides to build three new high-rise prisons instead of reforming the sentencing laws, or providing money for drug rehabilitation and mental health programs, we can wind the bridal wreath spirea into halos and call ourselves free. When the Chief Justice of our Supreme Court announces that this state doesn't have to abide by the decisions of our nation's Supreme Court because...well, because we're special...we can pick a bearded iris for our hair.

Spring does not make any of this right, or just, or compassionate, but it somehow shows us that there is a Higher Power who's not bound by human ignorance and fear, but is, instead, full of color and delight, and that life abounds in spite of the backward tug of Southern politics.

Yoga-Southern Style

                                                Day Devoted to the Stomach

          Lisa calls the class together. She is a young thing, benign looking with her long brown hair drawn back in a neat scrunch, but in truth, she holds a black belt in karate in addition to being a yoga master. She takes herself quite seriously, and does not suffer fools. "Ladies, please roll out your mats, remove your shoes and take your places. You may want a bolster or two, because today we'll be working on your abdominal muscles."

          Groans echo around the jute-matted room. Sara, who's been a yoga junkie for years, prettily removes her Jesus-sandals to show pink tipped toes, then gracefully lowers herself into a dignified lotus position. In her grass-green yoga tights, she looks like a frog queen sitting on a lily pad.

          “She’s so damn self-righteous,” Candy, my hefty friend, whispers in my ear. “I hope she busts a gut today. That spandex looks like it's glued on.”

          “Ssh! She can hear you!” I haul my mat and bolster to the back of the room to get as far away from Lisa as possible. I know she’ll be all over me for improper postures and having this fat-roll around my middle. Abs indeed! Mine are buried in the sins of six decades.

          Allison comes in late as usual. Lisa frowns and quickly points her to a space up front. If you’re late, she makes you pay for it. Poor Allison will now make a pure spectacle of herself before the whole class.

          Finally, we’re all settled in place. Lisa takes a seat on her mat and nimbly draws her long, lean legs into a perfect lotus. She touches middle fingertips to thumbs, closes her eyes and begins the low OM.

          Every time I start to OM, it catches in my throat and comes out in a strangled croak. I cough and hack, attempting to clear it. After the third hack, I risk glancing at Lisa. She's giving me the evil eye. “Get it together,” she silently mouths. My croak turns into a whimper.

          “Now, come to your hands and knees, and let's do the cat-cow stretch. Bring your back up and your head down…stretch…stretch…and hold.” Lisa's voice is a humming sing-song.

          Turning my head to the right, I see Sara, beatific smile on her face, stretching perfectly into the cat and then down into the cow. She appears to be in a trance and I wonder whether she throws back a couple of Valium before she heads out to Yoga. That’s the only thing that would put a smile like that on my face.

          “Faces straight ahead!” Lisa bellows from the front, and I know she's heading my way. Sure enough, two hands grab my fat roll and pull my back up to the breaking point.

          “Now slide your right foot forward as far as you can, and drop that left hip toward the mat.” She's got to be kidding, right?

          I hear a grunt from Candy as she attempts to walk her right foot up to the front of the mat.  “Uh-oh, I think I’m stuck!” she squeaks. Candy looks like someone frozen while leaping a hurdle. Lisa hurries over and attempts to pull her up, but Candy is at least twice Lisa’s size. There is a nauseating sound of ripping spandex. Candy grabs hold of Lisa, and they both go down. Everybody scrambles to get out of the way except, of course, Sara, who’s stretched into her long legged pose, looking as if the angels are singing in her ears.

          Accompanied by much cursing and snarling, Lisa untangles arms and legs to extricate herself from Candy’s massive embrace. I help Lisa arrange Candy’s feet so she can stand up, her shredded tights now hanging from her crotch.

          “To hell with abs,” Candy roars. She stomps over to Sara and shoves her into a heap on the floor, then throws her mat at Lisa and slams out the door.

          We look at one another, shell-shocked, but Lisa strides to the front and takes her place on the mat.  “Deep breaths into the belly, ladies…”