Y’all come back now

Mental Floss had an entry up today about obessession. I watched one of the videos about a guy obsessed with turkey hunting in Vernon, FL.

Then I went to YouTube and I watched more of the documentary. This is part 1.

And I am completely nostalgic and homesick for north Florida. The documentary is from 1982. In 1982, we lived in Lake Wales, which is not north Florida. It takes the smell of hot oranges to make me miss Lake Wales. That’s b/c of the orange juice processing plants. It’s like boiling o.j. Orange blossoms get me too. It’s more a cross of orange and gardenia, maybe a dash of jasmine.

This however… this is something else.

I was in Roaring Spring recently, which smells like its paper mill — on a good day. Whenever I smell a paper mill, it takes me right back to the town that this documentary reminds me of: Perry.

Perry is… well… it’s an imperfect place. But at the same time, it was the place I lived the longest until I was 13 years old and we moved to Bumblefuck. There are parts of Perry that I absolutely loved. Mostly the people, sometimes the landscape (a small town surrounded by swamp and forest), and sometimes the crash of late 1970s typicality and the deep South. Sometimes in life I’ve run into people who insist that Florida is not “the South.” These people have never visited Perry.

Let’s see if I can recall some quick Perry anecdotes…

Well, the local paper is/was “The TaCo Times.” That’s “Tay-Co” — Taylor County. and that’s pronounced “CAHnee.”

My grandmother had made an “antiqued” nativity set: ceramic, painted deep brown and glazed with black. Baby Jesus was white and glazed clear. At a Christmas party, my father’s assistant manager — “Dale” b/c there’s always a “Dale” — said, “Hey, where’d y’all get that chocolate nay-tivity with the white chocolate baby Jesus?”

My “boyfriend” was a boy named Rex. He used to serenade me with endless renditions of “Hound Dog.”

When Hurricane David went through, it ripped the roof of both the grocery store my father managed (the A&P) and the adjacent TG&Y (like a Kmart but better). The manager of the TG&Y was a friend of my father’s. His name was T.V. Leisure and he carved wooden toys in his free time.

The only other grocery in town was the Piggly Wiggly. The black folks shopped at the PW and the white folks shopped at the A&P. Perry is/was very segregated.

Our next-door-neighbor was named Spooky and his wife was Christine. Across the street and through the woods lived their son, Big Donnie. Big Donnie had a son my age: little Donnie. Spooky & Christine had a pop-up camper that we kids would all play in. Spooky was a sportsman, especially a fisherman. First time I ever went fishing, we went out with them. As ophidiophobic as I am, there is something about the really remote Florida woods/swamps that touches a very deep part of me. That documentary had some shots that went right through me. Perry had them, Lake Wales had them, Tallahassee had them (well technically Wakulla Springs & Crawford but still). I put that documentary on and closed my eyes and just listened to all that bug & bird noise in the swamps and it was like heaven. Sometimes, I’m such a paradox.

The neighbors a few doors down kept horses at their house. That’s how rural our neighborhood was. And might I just say, it wasn’t the country. It was a neighborhood. Just not like you’d find today with big houses on too-small lots.

Hurricane David also downed a tree in the nextdoor neighbor’s yard & it crashed through a front bedroom. They hadn’t been there that long either.

Despite Perry being segregated, I had more friends of varying ethnicities there than I did anywhere, including big-city-Tallahassee. I had an Indian friend named Mina. Their house was amazing. They had the most beautiful art — Ganesha and Vishnu statues and wall hangings. Mina’s mother wore brightly colored orange or green saris around the house. She was so lovely and elegant. It was like a different world. Also they had a sunken living room, an in-ground pool with a diving board and swinging saloon doors to the kitchen, just like on “Three’s Company.” I also had a Greek friend named Ephi. Ephi’s family cooked. A lot. The first time I ever saw beanie weenies was at Ephi’s house. I also had a black friend named Jimmy. Jimmy’s dad was the new guidance couselor at the elementary school. Their house was very modern-contemporary and his mother was also very elegant. She asked me if I wanted Neapolitan ice cream and I had no idea what it was. When she served it, I was amazed at how she got all three flavors to be stripey and stuck together. I liked visiting Jimmy’s house b/c it was walking distance for me. The other kids in walking distance were the twins with the horses (they were a little older than I) and Little Donnie and his sister, whose name escapes me. The house where the tree collapsed, people moved in & out of but once there was a girl there about my age. She had a lot of games, like PayDay and Cootie.

Someone shot out the windows of the local steakhouse. It was a huge news story. Apparently it was a case of jilted lovers. Perry also had a Pizza Hut (witha  jukebox) and a McDonald’s.

Halfway to Tallahassee (and it was an hour drive, up and down the biggest hills I’d ever seen — they’re still fairly impressive, given that it’s Florida), there was the only pit stop: Capps. Capps was a gas station. It had a restroom and they sold cold Coke in glass bottles. Being a little kid, I thought Capps was short for “bottlecaps” b/c that’s where you bought Cokes.

Apparently my southern accent was very thick. My brothers (who were, in case you’re not familiar, much older & not living at home) apparently tried to get Flora to make me shake it. Story goes that she kind of liked my “Maaah-ma.” For many, many years I could slip into that accent easily. I didn’t think I could do it anymore and then when Hawk was in the hospital and I had a whole hell of a lot on my mind, I was doing it. I had several people ask me if I was from the south. Then I realized it’s b/c I was doing the accent and using the phrases (and phrasing). I don’t know if Hawk noticed but he might’ve. I know it was still there after I’d picked that I was doing it. You ain’t lived ’til you’ve heard a mix of Southern & Pittsburghese come out in a single sentence. Or y’all. Or yinz.

In addition to the paper mill, Perry also smells like pine.  There are pines everywhere. I practiced braiding by doing it on pine needles. I wanted to learn to make baskets & stuff but never got around to it.

Perry’s big employer was (and still may be) the paper plant. When they’d have their annual family picnic,. every kid in town would go b/c if your dad didn’t work for the mill, your friends would invite you. They had their own grounds (I think) complete with the world’s most awesome playground.

Perry had a big department store downtown: The Emporium.

It also had a lot of old buildings, complete with wooden staircases and banisters for sliding on.

One thing about Perry was that in addition to racial segregation, there was also religious segregation. My father is a Catholic. Not acceptable in Perry. My mother would go to whatever Protestant church she liked that week (long story, not one I plan on telling any time soon). The acceptable choices in Perry were Baptist, Presbyterian (where we went; our minister was very young & handsome), Methodist and Assembly of God. Someone recently asked me, I think at Holden’s party, if I’d ever been to a Baptist church. Once you’ve been to Baptist church in Perry, FL, it spoils you for other Baptist churches. I even went to Baptist school (in Lake Wales btw) for chrissakes and it wasn’t as Baptist as church in Perry.

I think that’s about it. Surely wasn’t fixin’, er, expecting to do anything on Perry ever. But the documentary got to me.