I garnered enough material from my holidays spent in Georgia and South Carolina with Southern Gent to fill my column with stories clear to next Christmas.
Had I'd known dating him would produce this kind of fodder for writing, I'd have long ago considered the prospect more seriously.
Where to begin?
There's simply no way to say a thing and do it justice. Shall I start with our arrival to his parents' home -- my first meeting of them -- when their dog promptly bit my Baxter in the buttocks upon our exiting the car? Or shall I tell you of his great aunt who unabashedly spoke her unfiltered thoughts with such comedic timing as to make Carol Burnett envious? Or tell you one of the few questions his exceptionally proper Southern mama asked about me?
"What furnicha stahl does she hayuv?"
What what does she what? What furniture style does she have?
I can't say I anticipated that question. From anyone. Ever.
And since I've never really considered what furniture style I have, I'd venture a guess that Southern Gent hadn't considered it either. It's kind of a "Pottery Barn" meets "Sanford and Son" style, I suppose.
She'd also asked him when I was moving to Georgia (I'm not) and to what religious denomination I belonged.
Well, now that's a story in and of itself. He gave her a one word answer. Perhaps that was best, as had I been asked directly, my answer would've curled her toes.
You see, as far back as recollections went and records were kept, my family was Baptist, even when the Baptists wished we weren't.
Many years ago, my grandmother got kicked out of the Post Oak Baptist Church for opening a liquor store.
Actually, she and all of her progeny were kicked off the rolls, including my young mama and her brother. Oh, they claimed it was because she didn't attend (and therefore, tithe) which certainly didn't help matters, but everyone knew that wasn't the reason.
She hadn't been a regular attender for quite some time, but as soon as the lighted sign went up for Ruby's Package Store, the church secretary (who was also kin) commenced to writing hymnal pink slips. Guess they figured she couldn't be selling spirits and be filled with the Holy One, too.
So, my grandmother, who didn't drink a drop, started making a meager living by selling beer and Beanee Weenees to farmers in the rice field.
She had less to do with organized religion after that.
When my mother had a family of her own, it was important to her for us to go to church. I vividly remember us going to Township Line Missionary Baptist Church when I was very young. It was a tiny country church with white wooden walls covered in a thin layer of dust from the dirt road on which it sat. I liked that church.
We went there until I was about 7 years old, when my mother accused my father of various transgressions and believed the other church members knew and didn't tell her. She said if folks could sit on those pews with that attitude, they could have them.
She had less to do with organized religion after that.
When I went off to college, I attended a Baptist church now and then, and when I got married, it was important to me for us to go to church. We joined and became active in a small Baptist congregation. When we divorced, he stayed there and I started going elsewhere, to non-denominational churches mainly.
I think I might have been the first woman in my family to lose a Baptist church in a divorce. Regardless, I managed to keep tradition by leaving a Baptist church behind.
In more recent years, I started going to my sweet neighbors' church, sitting with them, helping them get to church functions and having a meal with them afterward. Though I've moved and the husband has passed away, I still regularly attend there. It's an Evangelical Free church, which is pretty much Southern Baptist, but I won't let on like I know.
So it seems my religious affiliation is a little like my furniture style. I'm a Pottery-Barn Baptist with a Sanford-and-Son reclaimed way of getting there. I can't wait to tell his parents.
With his mama Presbyterian and his daddy Lutheran, I figure it ought to make next Christmas lively.
LISA KELLEY IS A WRITER, MASTER GARDENER, ANIMAL LOVER AND ALL-AROUND GOOD OL' SOUTHERN GAL WHO ALSO HAPPENS TO PRACTICE LAW AND MEDIATE CASES IN DOWNTOWN BENTONVILLE.
Commentary on 01/08/2015