Day or night

, originally uploaded by zannafelts.

The Chair

I truly don't want to spend too much time disparaging the South here; it's just not my agenda. If anything, I'd rather tell stories that in some tiny way help the unfamiliar among you develop a less simplistic view of this region -- one not dominated by negative cliches and stereotypes.

But, you know, sometimes we need to bitch. And sometimes this place--no, its people--let me down.

This weekend on the way back to B'ham from Nashville, we stopped in Hartselle, Ala. to check out the antique stores there. Hartselle's one of those eensy towns with a picturesque Main Street that's remade itself in the last 10 years as an antique-hunter's destination.

Before I go gently into bitterness, I should point out that in the first store we wandered into, the proprietor was a genuinely friendly, helpful woman in her late 30s or early 40s. She gave me all sorts of advice on buying old chairs, told me where to find true deals, offered me her latest issue of Cottage Living, and just generally made us feel wanted. You know, the way you should feel when you're in a store, potentially about to spend your hard-earned cash.

We ducked in and out of about 10 stores after that, and the people working in them were also quite sociable--ready with the usual Southernisms, the "lemme know if thar's anything i kin help ye with."

But.

In one of the last places we tried, an old crow sat imperiously behind her raised counter, watching the goings-on. She looked like a lot of the other women we saw in our Hartselle hour: plump, pale, her face painstakingly painted, her hair a stiff white meringue that'd assuredly been set underneath one of those big, old-school beauty parlor hoods. These sort of women's faces seem to me the small Southern town's answer to kabuki theater. They exist firmly outside any natural flow of cultural change. I didn't even really give this woman a good look; she was nothing new to see. Besides, I was thinking about chairs.

We looked at one chair, then we stepped up into a brightly-lit section of the store that was a few feet elevated above the room we'd first entered. I looked at a chair there, too, and then I realized I was surrounded by a multitude of God and Jesus books and stuff, an excess of Christian tchotchkes and schlock. The whiteness, the light! The watercolor book covers! I took a step back.

Maybe that's where things went wrong; maybe she saw me look around, shudder, and retreat to the main room post haste--and she saw right there and then that I was Unsaved and Bound for Hell. I don't know. But as we crossed back by her throne, she greeted another group of shoppers (I can't rightly recall, but I'd put money on them being also a bit plump and somehow clearly identifiable to this lady as "one of us" in general physical appearance) and asked them if they wouldn't mind pushing a chair back in that these other people had left out.

I didn't even think about it at first. But she kept going on about the chair, loudly: when I pull out a chair I put it back in, and oh-ho-ho, that's just how I was always taught to do, and some people just weren't raised up right I reckon, it's all just in how you were raised, I was raised to push chairs back in, some people just weren't taught to do things right I guess---

---and on and on and onnnnnnn, to the point that finally, as I looked through a pile of picture frames, it occurred to me that she was talking about us. Her passive-aggressive message must have gone on for at least three minutes, full volume, before I caught on that the message was for me. I can't even figure out how she kept at it so long. I don't think the other customers--her shill audience--were even saying anything in response.

Todd and I realized what was happening at about the same time, I think. "Did we leave a chair pulled out?" he mumbled, reading my mind. (The thing is, I remember pushing the damn chair back beneath the table -- just, perhaps, not all the fucking way.)

I dropped the picture I was looking at, and strode out of the store--wanting to, like, spit on the floor as I pushed the door open. (Instead I just pushed aggressively.) And as I did, the lady sang out, "Come again!"

So this is the shit I hate about the South! Passive-aggressive bitches who talk a big game about propriety while simultaneously issuing their trademark brand of rudeness and exclusion. Come again, indeed. The gall! Like the Winona Ryder character in Reality Bites, this dame might not have been able to define irony, but she sure as hell knew what it meant.

I hesitate to tell this story here, because I don't want to enforce the idea that all Southern hospitality is at best an empty act, at worst ironic fakery. That's simply not true. I've encountered any number of warm, welcoming people here in the just the past four weeks, people who'd never pull such a stunt -- people who have manners enough not to. Manners are a tricky thing -- I'll be the first to say they're all too often a smoke screen behind which goes on all sorts of wretched behavior -- but when good people wield them well, I find it, well, comforting.

And then things like this happen, and the bile rises in the old throat, and I curse this place -- even though rude people reside everywhere. And even though I often much prefer the warm "act" of politesse, typical to the South, to the clipped, emotionless soical behavior we associate with the North. (And I don't know about you, but I think that stereotype contains a degree of truth, too.) Things like this happen and for a while, all I see here is...ugly.

Plus, you know, this lady struck low: in pulling out the "wasn't raised right" line, she was in effect dissing my mama, which, well, I do not take kindly to mama-disrespect.

In hindsight, I wish we'd done what Todd later suggested: played her game, and just walked right up to her and said, equally loudly, "Did we forget to put that chair back in? Oh. Well then. I sure am sorry about that." Oh, she would've squirmed. (Todd clearly has a better handle on dealing with these types than I.)

I was in a semi-foul mood for the next 24 hours. I got on a missing-Chicago kick. On Sunday it was warm enough to ride my beater bike around deserted downtown Birmingham wearing a tank top, so I did. (Post-tantrum.) Deserted downtown Birmingham only served to complement my gloom for a while--all the empty storefronts, the slow rot, the potential (cool old building stock!) that's been ignored for too too long while the suburbs bloat and bloat! the distance this city has to yet to go, and the effort it will take! and really, will it happen? and what am I doing here? can I be a part of something good? I don't know--but after a while I started taking pictures. And ended up feeling better. How about that.

I am still in search of. . .chairs.

Not Quite a Charlie Brown Christmas

Good old Vince Guaraldi just doesn't sound as sweet and right to me when it's like 73 degrees outside.

Oh, to have to bundle up. I want my Charlie Brown Christmas.

MyStd

I should have known better. I had to go get involved with a bad crowd, didn't I? Had to start messing around. Now MySpace has given my browser a disease; I'm sure of it.

Ugh.

Tomorrow I must work magic on sweet potatoes (we never called them yams; did you?) and cream some spinach. More Birmingham fun to come, I promise. I can't believe I haven't said at least a little bit more about Sloss yet. That is shameful. I'll get there, I know it.

Straddlin'

We spent the day in Tuscaloosa on the eve of the Iron Bowl, as there was an annual turkey fry to attend that afternoon and, that evening, a cocktail party at the company president's house. There was talk of football, trucking conventions, church. That sort of thing. I got some leads on some interesting assignments. In the hours between the social gatherings Todd worked, and I sat in the car (yeah, honestly. I was just too comfortable there, parked on a side street near the Bama stadium, to get up and walk a block to a coffee shop) and read Black Hole and took a nap. I awoke when someone screamed "Roll Tide!" and another someone responded, "War Eagle!" (I know you don't want me to bother to explain. . .)

After the gatherings, the drive back to B'ham, Three 6 Mafia on the stereo. And then Califone and the Judy Green at Bottletree. Strange, and a little frustrating indeed, to go from a social event where you're required to converse pleasantly with people you mostly have not so much in common with, to a social event where it's nearly impossible to strike up conversation with a bunch of people you probably have a lot in common with. Eh. I did run into the fine ladies of Red Blondehead in the bathroom -- I recognized them from the Web -- and said hello. And then almost cut in front of one of them! Oops. Blame it on the High Life, and the cultural vertigo. . .

The Judy Green hadn't been playing long when Todd realized the Skylark kitchen manager was in the band. And afterwards he discovered that the guy who books bands for the Hideout was running sound for Califone.

We stood listening to Tim Rutilli's wonderful trademark drawl supplemented by the Skylark kitchen manager on trombone and the drummer's interesting percussive textures, and I closed my eyes and could see myself driving east on Chicago -- the long, flat artery, its busy grey shoulders of commerce. . . Got a little bit blue there for a few minutes, I admit it. But it passed.

During Califone's encore, I found a copy of the latest Punk Planet that somebody had left on the bar, and paged through it, noting names of Chicago compadres: Euguenia. Elizabeth. Al. Anne. Joe. Etc.

So yeah, worlds collided. This is the way we live now.

Heluva Good

I don't think this is available in Chicago.

This weekend, Alabama plays Auburn.

Apparently this is a Very Big Deal. People around here care. They care a lot.

The good news is that the impending collective madness prompted a local to give me the best piece of newcomer advice I've heard yet:

By the way, if you want to do any Christmas shopping at our malls, the prime time to do it is this weekend during the Auburn-Alabama game. The entire state will come to a screeching halt for that, and if you do run into any people, they'll most likely be in the electronics departments of the stores watching the game on TV.

So yes, I'll be donning my turkey applique sweatshirt on Saturday and heading to the Summit. Goddamn right.

The other weekend we fearlessly strode on to the U of A campus in Tuscaloosa at the end of a home game. We were supposed to do something called "tailgating" with people from Todd's work. We're good sports, right? But we neglected to wear crimson, or anything with the word "ALABAMA" on it for that matter, and were thus subjected to angry jeers from the fans pouring out of the stadium. A grim lot they were: Bama had lost to Mississippi State (my dad's alma mater, incidentally). You'd think these people had witnessed Bear Bryant's execution or something: the tear-streaked faces, downcast eyes. Until they caught sight of us in our various shades of black, that is. Grief gave way to anger, as it will. I took a pom-pom in the face. Todd got swatted by a bleacher cushion. Both of us were pelted by koozies.

"That'll teach ya to wear some...some...jean jacket!" a lady shrieked.

"Roll TIDE, or get the hell outta here!" her husband boomed.

"Roll tide!" squeaked their fat child, who threw his Chik-fil-A cup at me.

We scurried to the nearest magnolia tree and took shelter under its branches. Once we'd regained our composure, I dug a lipstick out of my purse and painted big slimy As on our cheeks, and we ventured into the tent city of tailgaters. People had rallied a little. They had their Lites and plates of barbeque and clumps of potato salad. They had their plasma screens set up so they could watch Tennessee get the shit kicked out of them, too. They ignored us.

We never did find Todd's company peeps, alas. But we heard the twangy opening notes of "Sweet Home Alabama" eight times, and caught an impromptu karaoke performance of "Thank God I'm a Country Boy."

Party on.

OK. I'm in.

Please, be mine.

With any hope I'll learn how to pretty-up my profile soon. If you know some good tips, pass 'em along, please and thank you!

bottleluuuv

Psst -- I have a new crush. Don't tell Todd! She's just so lovely and charming, all decked out in orange and green and twinkle lights. She likes to accessorize with things like glittery deer and old bird cages and sprawling succulents and vintage lunch boxes and an illuminated case of pretty glass bottles in all sizes and shapes, and she does not smoke -- doesn't even allow it anywhere around her! OK, that's not totally true; she allows it on her covered patio, but I'm almost distracted enough by the plants and the interesting old cabinets and flea market treasures when I'm out there that I can forget that someone right next to me is slowly killing himself with a cig.

Oh, and pretty soon, she's going to make me a vegetarian dinnah; yum! She's going to make it for lots of other fans and friends too, though; don't get the wrong idea. She's got some really cool pals, and something about her just encourages them to show off their talents. They come from fah, fah away to be in her presence. And how lucky for them to get green goodness when they show up at her door!

Thing is, she's sort of new in town too. But all her family's here, so she's more grounded than I.

Honestly, I'm not even sure she's a she--she could just as easily be a he, but there's something about her that just seems femme to me, even though she's the kind of femme that would always have lots of guy pals hangin' around, you know?

Whatever. Gender doesn't matter. Let the love flow.

Jem garage

Jem garage 2, originally uploaded by zannafelts.

Teens, Tacos

Privileged, white Southern teen boys have not changed since I was among them as a peer 15 years ago. The untucked Oxfords, the baggy shorts, the shaggy or frizzy hair. The fumblings at swagger. Only thing that's changed is the cell phone clamped to the palm.

We braved the Summit last night to see Borat (Thumbs up! Todd observes that it was painful how accurate the SC boys were) and waded into a teen sea. All the pampered Southern youth!

It was too familiar.

Before that, we tried a taqueria called Cantina: really cute and colorful, like a roadhouse sweetened up by a gal with good taste. The inside tabletops were old tin beverage signs. It was warm enough to dine al fresco though, so we did. I had one taco de pollo and one with grilled shrimp; both were excellent. Todd had a Cuban sandwich with garlic homefries. He says the hot sauce there -- El Yucateca? -- is a Funderburk fave.

No more worries about finding good South-of-the-border food.

In lieu of storm clouds:

Wheat-pasting, Birimingham-style. 5th Ave. N.

What's with the Pac-Man ghostie shape, I wonder?

Heavy

Oh, the joys of a Wiki. Today I learn that we live a block west of the so-called Heaviest Corner on Earth, at which stands the gorgeous Empire Building, pictured here. (The relative scarcity of skyscrapers in the Birmingham city center is kind of cool, because the ones that are here really stand out; they have room to make an impact.)

The 1st Ave. N/20th St. intersection took the "Heaviest" nickname in the early 20th century when the four skycrapers on each of its corners rose between 1902 and 1912. The Woodward Building (the first completed, in 1902) is Chicago style, and was the first steel frame high-rise here.

Industrial boom put B'ham on the map in the late 19th and early 20th century as the biggest city in the state, and to some degree a place with less in common with the rest of (very agrarian) Alabama than the cities of the Northeast.

Thanks to its mineral blessings--the area was rich with deposits of iron, coal, and limestone--Birmingham was a steel town for a long time, and is sometimes referred to as the "Pittsburgh of the South" for that reason. U.S. Steel still operates the Fairfield Works 10 miles west of downtown. (And then there's the repurposed Sloss Furnaces, which we'll visit for the first time Sunday to see some deconstructed Shakespeare, so more TK, there.) A "New South" city, Birmingham didn't exist prior to the Civil War, which for obvious reasons made the South keen to develop industrially and build an extensive railroad network. Key to the city's founding was a plan for north-south and east-west train lines to intersect here. (No navigable river in sight, and the valley was in the heart of poor hill country, hemmed in on its north and south sides by small mountains.) Northern capital was also key.

And now, in this re-reconstructed New South? It's all about banking and medical research. And lifestyle magazines.

So much exploring to do. I spied a giant abandoned building from the interstate the other day, and I hope to prowl around it. (To me, it read "asylum," but I'm sure that's my own weird brand of romantic spin.)

A Moving Vista

We decided to embrace downtown Bham's very nascent city-center/loft living scene, and are shacked up in the Jemison Flats, a building on 1st Avenue that used to be the Chamber of Commerce and was renovated into loft-style apartments in 2003. The apartment is, well, it's an odd raw bird; more on that later. (We like it a lot. It's just....as Todd's dad would say, "Diff'rent.") Our south-facing balcony looks onto Morris Avenue (just a bit east, Morris turns historic, with cobblestone streets and great old buildings, though there's overall a sense of vacancy to it) and the railroad tracks that divide downtown from the Southside part of Birmingham and the UAB campus area.

These are no inactive tracks. Trains rumble back and forth all day and night long, pretty much. Sometime one's going west while another's going east. They're not very noisy -- they're going pretty slow since they're smack-dab in the city at this point -- but they do make a nice low, rumbly sound. Occasionally there's a whistle blast, and bells clang. Occasionally there are appealingly muted metal squeals and screeches. Our enjoyment of all these sounds is muffled somewhat by the fountain in the "public park" at the back of our our building (more on that later, too), and we suspect that's by design: a fountain to mask the train noises. But I'd much prefer unadulterated rumbles and bells and squeals over the white noise of falling water.

I want to learn more about the trains: what sort of things they're carrying (all sorts, probably), where they come from, where they're going. Who becomes a train engineer or conductor these days? It's something to explore. I'm sorta hooked.

I did immediately read John McPhee's chapter on coal trains in Uncommon Carriers, which I'd given my dad for his birthday, while I was in Nashville Sunday night. (There's also a great chapter on an owner-operator of a tanker truck; I'd read it in the New Yorker years ago.) McPhee briefly mentions how modern-day hoboes are known to climb inside autoracks, get inside the cars they carry, and turn the cars on for warmth and, I suppose, radio listening. (The cars are driven off the autoracks, so they all have keys in them.) Some companies started locking the cars, and angry hoboes apparently bit back by breaking into them and urinating and defecating in them. Wild stuff! So I stare out my window at what I think are probably autoracks going by (these tall cars with what look like metal blinds as siding) and wonder if there are hoboes in there. . .

Turns out the Amtrak station is right behind our place on Morris. When the Amtraks pull in, we can see the people disembark and hear the conductor announcing the stop.

So take Amtrak to come visit us, eh? When you step off the train we'll be right there, waving at you from the balcony. Look for the seven-story building with a crazy tree mural covering it! (Pic of that coming soon.)

Meanwhile, I'll be wondering if any of these trains are hauling coal. Todd thinks so. We can't tell for certain though.

Note: In the picture there are two trains. The one on the track farther south (farther from the camera) is what's known as intermodal: it's carrying double-decker semi-trailers, of which only the top ones are visible.

(Transport. More interesting than you thought.)

Alabama? WTF?

OK, herewith, a lazy substitute for a mission statement, not that a blog needs one of those(though yes, it does need a central idea):

This is a document of the F---s-D---s duo's crazy decampment from Chicago to Birmingham, Ala., and their Southern adventures small and large to come. This is geared to those who know us and just might wonder from time to time how on earth we're living down here.

Will it be self-indulgent? In dribs and drabs, yes. And without too much apology, if I can possibly resist the tendency. I'm doing this for me as much as you, my lovelies.
Will it poke a few holes in your smug preconceptions of the red-state South? I hope.
Will it also solidify some of those preconceptions? There's little doubt.

Will it be all true? Nah. We reserve the right to fictionalize.

Will the prose be spit-shined to a high gloss? Not so much. I'm mostly trying to keep you in our lives in some fashion. (And us in yours, natch.) This ain't no blog-to-book project.

- - -

I've posted a bunch of back-dated entries for October, which of course forces me to reflect on, and cringe at, the maudlin tone of the past month's scribbled notes. It's probably not much of a surprise that a week into the new life, I'm feeling dangerously optimistic. Quick, someone tell me about something supercool that I'm missing so I can feel like shit again!

Crazy windy (and rainy) here tonight. Good and familiar.

Lots of train action too. People, my interest in freight trains has spiked. Expect to hear more about it.

4th Annual Dia de los Muertos at Bare Hands Gallery

A new friend told me about this public art event happening at a gallery just a few blocks from our place, so we decided to check it out. His description reminded me of the first Redmoon Logan Square Halloween spectacle I attended many years ago, and that turned out to be not an entirely inaccurate comparison. In a long corridor only about three feet wide, people had covered the walls with homespun altars to deceased loved ones, and the whole place was strung with lights and littered with marigolds and paper butterflies. You were encouraged to bring mementos to add. I loved the quotidian objects people had set out in memory of their departed: cigs, favorite foods, golf balls. And of course, lots of photos.

The effect was dizzying, kaleidoscopic, joyful, touching, intriguing. The corridor ran between the back door of the gallery and a door onto the alley, where larger altars were set up outside and murals and paintings hung on the brick walls. Gallery staff served wine and beer under a tent set up in an adjacent parking area, and little kids made sugar skulls at a nearby table.

In a big open, paved space next to the gallery, two bands played at once, kitty-corner from each other. One one stage a woman was doing this weird spoken-wordish singing with accordion accompaniment; on the other, a mariachi band played songs that their crowd seemed to know all the words to. Scattered around the lot were more altars--these a little more like tomb-markers--and small fire pits. There was food, too: fresh tamales and quesadillas from, I believe, Sol y Luna, a restaurant I'm eager to try out. (Confidential to Tori: Look! Real Mexican food!)

While I thought of the old Redmoon days, Todd was reminded of the Pilsen pig roasts -- a bunch of arty-goofy people lighting fires in urban areas -- but with a more diverse crowd (in terms of age, at least; here, there were a good number of little kids). But enough with the comparisons: it was just the kind of grass-roots, community-supported event that feels totally authentic and makes you feel like you're part of something special. We loved it. I felt hopeful. The gallery also offers yoga classes (in the gallery) Monday and Wednesday nights, which I think I'll have to try.

Dispatch from Hwy 280, or, Integration

I ventured to Target today. Down a big wide road I drove, listening to classic rock, and when I saw a Chik-fil-A, I thought, Why not? (Dirty secret: I used to really like Chik-fil-A.)

It was almost 11 a.m., not too far from a reasonable lunchtime. I’d eaten no breakfast. I figured I’d go whole hog on the Southern suburban thing, at least these first few days. I’d eat Chick-fil-A and I’d eat it earlier than anyone should. (I should note that there were several cars queued up at the drive-thru.)

The woman behind the counter pointed out that I could still order from the breakfast menu (that better explains the throngs at the drive-thru), but my order of a #1 lunch combo was fine. But “it’ll be a few minutes for the fries.” OK, no problem. While I waited on those, I realized that it was only 9:45 – we hadn’t set the clock back in the Corolla yet.

But what the hell. A fast-food lunch at 10 a.m. I got back in the car with my bag of fat and started eating deep-fried chicken on a bleached bun, and hot hot waffle fries. I was in sweatpants, covered in greasy crumbs, heading down a big road in search of a Target. And I discovered that they’d packed my sandwich with not one, but TWO pieces of deep-fried Chik.

This is how we live now, I reckon.

The commercial landscape is horrifying: all the sprawl and big-box and parking lots you can conjure so easily, all the wide-open space so cluttered up with ugliness, sameness. Hello, American South. (Hello America, really.) And yet, the big road wound and swooped over lovely hills thick with trees, and I did achieve some kind of autumn-bright vista across these Appalachian wrinkles. I drove, and felt an odd exhilaration: because it was terrible and expected, because it was actually my new life. In some crazy sense, it excited me. I suppose I like a backdrop to pop against.

Update on Chik-fil-A: I am happy to report I won’t be fighting off cravings. This shit tastes incredibly bland to me now.

Next up: Krystal.