Since birth, I’ve have lived in the small town of Felicity, which is so rural that it doesn’t even have turnip trucks to fall off when residents move to the big city. (We make do with tobacco wagons). There are some disadvantages, such as the fact that every one there seems to see Deliverance as a model for life; or that most of the residents thinks the Beverly Hillbillies were city slickers before they moved, but there is at least one advantage—it presents a fascinating and instructive look into the lives of our country fried friends.
Many people think that country life is all chicken fries, souped up cars, and tractor pulls. Of course, that narrow, stereotyped view is outdated and snobbish, as there is much more to country living, such as drunken brawls, tobacco spitting contests, and Larry the Cable Guy marathons on CMT.
One of the activities most enjoyed by young Felicitians (Felictites? Feliciench? Felicitish? Felicitis? Futch?) is cruising, where you get in your car, drive up and down main street, and…that’s all really, it’s not a very intellectual activity. They enlivened it by shouting stuff at each as they drive by, but thanks to the Doppler effect (or is the Doppler effect only on trains?), you can never decipher anything they say. But that doesn’t stop them from trying, because you never know when the laws of physics might suddenly bend and permit conversations from cars traveling thirty miles per hour in opposite directions.
When not shouting out of cars, it is considered very fun to pump music really loud using just bass. You can’t really understand any of the music, but it’s probably just Nickelback anyway so they’re not missing much.
There are three kinds of cars in Felicity—new mega-gas-guzzler-climate-changing-enormo-pick-ups, smaller pickups, and decrepit sedans. The big pickups are driven by prosperous farmers, who usually have noticeable Southern accents but are actually very educated (to run a farm, you need an education). So it’s really confusing to see a guy dressed like Jed Clampett’s younger brother step out of his pick-up and start talking in a hillbilly voice about soil acidity. “Well, if the Ph o’ that thar soil in the north forty don’t not get above 6 or therebouts, we jest won’t have a tobaccy crop.”
The smaller pick-ups are driven by common farm workers. They aren’t very interesting, since they aren’t prosperous or educated, and will be doing menial, underpaid work till the end of their lives, so they mostly just look forward to Friday night down at Felicity Pub and Bar. They don’t take a very wide view of the world, and are the people Garth Brooks sings about. (See the American Honky Tonky Bar Association for example).
The sedans are driven by everyone else, and they are always American made. Which means that if they’re over five years old—and they are—they are always practically falling apart with rust patches, missing exhaust pipes, and occasionally a broken axle. Their final resting place is someone’s front yard, and they do work as serviceable yard ornaments. (At least, they’re better than plastic flamingoes, which are their main competition). And they keep away door-to-door salesmen, because no one with a car in their yard has any money to spend. Unless it’s for a subscription to Guns and Ammo magazine.
Whenever a teenaged Felicitian gets one of these sedans, he always tries to soup it up, and make it a real “hot rod.” Unfortunately, since it’s a 1995 Cavalier, he doesn’t have much to work with.
So no matter how much he works on his future General Lee, it never gets much faster. But it does get louder, because everyone revs their engine whenever possible, which would be much cooler if the speed limit along Main Street wasn’t twenty-five miles per hour.
The only memorable thing about Felicity is the Feed Mill.
With a few exceptions, everything in Felicity is about twenty years out of date—in fact, the town just heard about 9/11 two weeks ago. (The general consensus was that we need to teach the Soviets a stiff lesson). All the signs for pop (the soft drink, I mean, not what Britney Spears sings) and what not have the old logos from about seven years, ago, and the gas stations don’t have pay at the pump, so you have to go in and tell them how many gallons you need, which is not something I usually know off the top of my head, so I always way overpay or underpay.
Many of you will never make it out to Felicity. So hopefully this post will let you vicariously experience country life, although come to think of it I have no idea why you would want to. But I’ve already written it, and there’s no way I’m going to just delete it, so you might as well read it anyway.
No comments:
Post a Comment