Southern sensitivities

So we all know about southern cooking, southern hospitality, and southern baptists. Today I would like to add another southern tradition to this list: southern sensitivity, or the southern definition of rude. If you're ever planning a visit down south, will be moving down here, or live here as a "northern transplant" (and yes, anyone not from the south is in fact northern), you may want to sit up and pay attention, lest you spend your time in the south inadvertently insulting the locals left and right.

I know I've talked about how southerners don't take "no" very well, but lately I've had to come to the conclusion that there more to the southern understanding of rudeness than that. Basically, proper southern behavior calls for a lot more politeness that non-southerners will ever think to use. A lot more. And I'm not just talking about saying "thank you" and "please". I'm talking about keeping one's opinion to oneself, knowing when to be quiet, when to defer to someone else, right down to when to adopt a certain facial expression or even posture, among other things. And just to get things straight - I don't get this. I try, for sure, but fail most of the time. As one of my friends told me the other day, with a sad but encouraging smile on her face, I'm just too much like a New Yorker. I tell it like it is, and that is definitely a no-go area as far as southerners are concerned. For the past three years I've tried to change, to blend in, but with very little success. And then just a few days ago, a "northern" (read: non-southern) friend of mine who lives down here too, told me a story that made me feel a whole lot better about my failed attempts at southern politeness.

This particular friend works at a sporting goods store, and knows just about everything there is to know about running. She can tell all you'll ever want to know about different gaits, foot types, shoes, injuries, remedies, training schedules, and anything else you can think of. So when you show up to her store, and ask for her a pair of shoes, she will take you through a few tests, watch you walk, and then tell you all about the type of shoe that will probably work best for your feet, gait, and mileage. It's fairly straightforward, and Mary, my friend, is very professional when she walks you through it. And by professional, I mean polite but to the point. There's no fluttering eyelashes, "oh my word"s, or silly girlie smiles. As far as I am concerned, that's just fine. You are, after all, asking a running expert for shoe advice, not trying to get a pageant contestant to talk about world peace. Apparently, however, true southerners disagree with me. You see, a few weeks ago, a southern gentleman came into the sister store in a large town to the north, and when told by the salesperson that he could have purchased the same shoes at Mary's store, which was much closer to his home, he shook his formidable head, and proclaimed he was never ever going to that store again. When asked why, the man told him that the skinny blonde at that store had been so horribly rude to him, he refused to set foot in his store.
"You mean Mary?" The sales associate had asked, "Mary? Tall, skinny, blond?"
"Yes, she was just horrible. Telling me what to buy and what to do."
"Really? Most people think she's super nice" the sales associate had said.
Well, apparently Mr. Southern gentleman didn't think so, and had sent several people from his church to Mary's store to check her out, and they all agreed.

Besides the fact that sending people from your church to check something out sounds like the south's answer to the mob to me; if you fail to obtain the southern baptist's social rules committee's standards, they will withdraw their approval of your store, I was just flabbergasted by the fact that acting like an expert, because, hey, that's what you are, can be construed as offensive. It feels almost the same as when my male students get upset when I tell them they're wrong. Or when our male technicians get upset when I, the younger, female professor, direct them to do something. It seems that pulling rank is only acceptable if you're high up in the community's social hierarchy, a position that, guess what, is out of reach for "northern" women. If you're an expert at anything here in the south, and you're a female, you seem to have two choices: 1) keep your mouth shut and look pretty, or 2) open that same mouth and be judged, albeit behind your back. 

And as Mary and I debated the intricacies of southern notions of rudeness over lunch, I realized I needed a refill on my water, just when the waitress walked up to our table.
"Oh great, there you are! " I said to the waitress who had been awol for a good fifteen minutes, "I was just thinking I needed a refill."
The waitress gave me a funny look, and walked off to get the water
I turned to Mary, "That was rude, wasn't it?"
"Just southern rude" She said.

So from now on when someone acts as though I'm rude (or God forbid, tells me, although that in itself is considered very impolite), I'm going to not start by doubting myself. I think from now on, I'm going to start by analyzing them. Because southern rudeness? I don't play that game. Southern baptists be...I guess I better not finish that sentence.