LJ Idol Topic 10: You're So Vain, You Probably Think This Topic is About You

She said she didn't want to wind up stuck in a hotel in BFE*, Mississippi. Because all of Louisiana is New Orleans, you know.  Just so you know, it really isn't.

 

But, the part of Louisiana to which she was referring, well, I was born and raised there.



The red dot on the map between the two 'p's of Mississippi is my hometown.

 

It most certainly was about me.

 

I’d extended an invitation along with my fellow cyber-snarking Louisianans for New Jersey to come visit. All of our little group would manage to be in New Orleans at some point for drinking and eating and talking and laughing. It would be a grand time. Until she made her demands and the record skipped.

 

I didn’t say anything.  I laughed it off and my BFF*s in BFE came up with a cutesy name for ourselves to make us feel better. But, I decided that I didn’t really want to show my beloved city in my beloved state to some jackass from New Jersey. I pulled away from my little internet support system there and clung to bitterness in my heart at a flippant try at humor.

And every time I’m in BFE, Mississippi, I look around and I see everything that New Jersey missed.
 

We have parishes and drive-thru liquor stores and drinks named after natural disasters. Hell, we survive natural disasters. We have the longest bridge in the world. We have statues of men on horses, wrought iron balconies and people that will do anything to get some beads, mister.

 

We are a state steeped in culture and history, in music and food, in politics and weather. 

 

That Tabasco sauce you like on your eggs?  Came from here.  That oil and gas you like to use to ride and fly around?  Came through here.  Most of the imported goods around your house?  Came through here.  Miss Merry Christmas?  Came from here.  The toughest Steel Magnolias I know?  Here.  People not leaving for the better job or the better city in the better state?  Here.  Trying to make a difference.  Trying to reclaim our Louisiana.  They keep trying to wash us away, but we won’t go.

 

We can read and we can write and we even wear shoes on most days.  Not all of us have alligators as pets or have to row to work.  We sometimes use “ain’t” and “y’all” in a sentence, but that just adds to the flavor.  And by the way, y’all is plural.

 

We’re born knowing how to make a roux, that things are not always pronounced the way they are spelled, and what that little piece of tape over the straw-hole in the go-cup is for.

 

There’s more to Louisiana than what you learned watching The Big Easy. 

 

It’s probably for the best that New Jersey missed out on experiencing my Louisiana.  She probably wouldn’t have appreciated it anyway.



BFE - slang term, Bum-Fucked Egypt, meaning the middle of nowhere, the end of the earth, past civilization, offensive to bums and Egyptians everywhere
BFF - Best Friends Forever, what Paris Hilton is trying to find on MTV, I'm glad I don't have to find my friends there.