Bluegrass

My mother was from Kentucky. She made the best Chess Pie you've ever had and she knew how to make poke salad from weeds in the yard. She saved the bacon grease from breakfast and used it to make lima beans and hoe cake. She even made her own syrup. She was also the master of sweet tea and fried green tomatoes. My mother was a southern queen.

When I was a kid, Momma used to take my brother and me to Bluegrass festivals. I didn't really enjoy it. I was a 9-year-old child, fidgeting to the sound of old men playing banjos. We'd sleep on the screened in porch of my Aunt Faye and Uncle Tom’s house and in the morning we'd be woken by the sound of Bluegrass gospel music playing on the radio. The roosters crowing, the fresh scent of mountain mist and a fatty breakfast would wake us.

Now I am 30 and I love Bluegrass. It makes me think of old pick up trucks and dirt roads. I remember the clean spring water trickling down the hills in Kentucky and those country boys who were just fine living in the hills. I always had a crush on John Boy Walton and could not stop looking for him.

Bluegrass reminds me of a Kentucky full moon and fireflies. It reminds me of the dreams of a southerner. We just want to live simply. Often I dream of running off to England or Australia, but then I remember that there is something about a southerner that only a person from the south can understand. I would miss the south.

I once dated a man from St Louis. He did not even like to camp. I always dreamed about sitting on a screened-in porch with a southern mate while we drank sweet tea and watched the stars. We'd sit in rocking chairs, talking about the beauty of the hills. He'd be brilliant, yet as country as me.

I realized that a girl who loves bluegrass and bacon fat cannot be happy with a city boy who does not. I could not be with a man who did not love Johnny Cash and fried green tomatoes. Those things are a part of me, and denying that would have hurt me in the long run.

I always think of my aunt Martha Jean and my Uncle Aubry. They have been together for over 40 years. They go fishing together, camp together, and laugh together. You can tell that they enjoy one another’s company. They have always been my idea of a perfect couple. If Aunt Martha Jean had married some man from New York, I doubt she’d have been happy.

I’m not saying it is impossible for people from a different background to be together and be happy, but I often think that we should stay true to ourselves by embracing what makes us who we are, and Bluegrass music is a part of me.

Good thing I married a man from Kentucky.