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| A sign in a highway rest stop. |
“There’s so much nothing. It’s just nothing everywhere. I’ve
never seen so much nothing in my life,” I kept repeating emphatically to my
parents as we drove into the Mississippi Delta on our first trip to visit the
state that will in two months be my home.
We had arrived in Mississippi in mid-February for a race. I
had been offered the opportunity to come help out at the Mississippi River Marathon, which benefits Teach for America. I was visiting over Valentine’s Day
weekend and would have the change to get to know the state and it’s people a
little bit while I was there, including meeting community members and current
corps members and taking some time to visit some classrooms. When the chance
was presented to me back in December I jumped on it and immediately set about
the surprisingly easy task of getting my parents on board for the ten-hour car
ride.
When we set out early on a Thursday morning, I was eager to
see a new part of the country and to learn a little bit more about my new home,
but I was nonetheless nervous. When I made my commitment to teach in
Mississippi I knew I was going to end up feeling like a stranger in a strange
land, and I feared that visiting the state for the first time would exacerbate
my nerves about the coming foreignness.
The ride was long and mostly boring. Because I live in the
very southwest corner of Ohio, there were really only three states to drive
through on our trip: Kentucky, Tennessee, and Mississippi. Having driven
through Kentucky and Tennessee many times before, I would have to wait for the
prospect of a new landscape to observe until we had ventured all the way
through the familiar foothills of the mid-South. Fortunately, with me and both
my parents driving, the long trip was a little less taxing and no one openly
objected to listening to Taylor Swift’s “1989” on repeat during my three hour
driving shift.
The first thing worth noting when we reached Mississippi was
the welcome center. As a family of mildly versed travelers, my parents and I
had seen many-a-welcome-center, but Mississippi’s was the first that offered
free coffee to weary road-trippers. As my parents perused travel brochures
about the many Civil War sites and sleepy towns that they could visit, I paced
around nervously, suddenly very aware of how much my life was going to change
in four months.
As we entered the Delta it was hard not to notice just how
flat everything was. Growing up in the Midwest, I thought I knew what flat
looked like. After all, I had been subjected to the torturous drive through
Indiana on multiple occasions, but the truth is Indiana ain’t got nothing on
the Mississippi Delta. The Delta is as flat as a piece of paper and it left me
feeling oddly exposed. For miles around us all I could see was empty fields
interrupted occasionally by the odd clump of trees or a lone building.
In addition to the disconcerting emptiness, it was also hard
not to notice the many vivid colors. We were driving in at sunset and I have to
say I had never before seen a sunset quite like a Delta sunset. Because the
land is so flat, the sky swallows everything and every color you’ve ever
associated with a sunset surrounds you fully. Drinking in the colors of my
first Delta sunset, I clung to the notion that maybe this masterpiece in the
sky was a sign that I would find good things among the foreign scenery.
When we finally arrived in Indianola, where we were to meet
some corps members for dinner, it came to my attention that I had no dress
shoes to wear to visit schools the next day. Since we had a half an hour to
spare before dinner, we found a store and, standing in the shoe aisle, I
jokingly remarked to my mom that I always knew that one day I would end up
frantically searching for dress shoes in a crowded Walmart in the middle of
nowhere and she replied that she wasn’t sure where she’d gone wrong in raising
a daughter who wouldn’t double check that she’d packed appropriate footwear.
After the unfortunate shoe mishap, things started to look
up. Over the course of the next two days I was able to talk with current corps
members who provided practical advice (Invest heavily in bug spray) and another
future corps member from Alabama who shared a little bit about life in the
South (No, not all Southerners like to eat in restaurants in gas stations;
that’s a Mississippi thing) and community members who graciously welcomed me
and my family to their home for dinner (And, in one meal, demonstrated the
absolute culinary superiority of the South).
I was also assaulted by kindness from strangers. People
would say hello and ask how I was doing even though I had never met them
before. Everywhere I went strangers had something nice to say. One day I
chatted with a waiter in a Mexican restaurant about making the move out from
the big city and the next I spoke at length with a man who was in the middle of
running a marathon in every one of the fifty states. It quickly became evident
to me that Southern hospitality and friendliness is no myth and every one of
those conversations eased my fears about the coming transition.
On the way back home, my parents asked me if I thought the
trip had been worth it. I responded that it had been. I was so much less scared
of what lay in front of me after my two days in Mississippi. Perhaps I had only
seen a fraction of the state and of the story, but after being barraged at home
by negative stereotypes of the Deep South, it was comforting to learn that the
reality just wasn’t that simple. My dad agreed with this assessment, saying
that before he had visited he had a pretty negative image of Mississippi,
constructed from history, current events, and Hollywood portrayals of the
state, but after our visit his understanding shifted.
Looking back a month and a half later, I like to think I was
right about the sunset being a sign. The kindness and hospitality I saw in
Mississippi assuaged my anxieties significantly, though, to be sure, they still
linger. I understand that the reality of Mississippi is likely neither the
frightening stereotype I had previously imagined or the narrow slice I saw in
my brief visit. Likely, it is a mixture of both and, just like the people of
the state the statistics are complex. Mississippi may have the lowest per
capita income in the country, but they rank second highest in per capita
charitable giving. I suspect that my
experience will reflect the realities and complexities of this fact and, while
I may find myself surrounded by poverty and destitution, I will also find
myself surrounded by compassion and community, the vivid colors amongst that
flat, flat landscape.
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