Belonging

July 13, 2020

We’re getting used to the idea of moving to South Carolina. Or trying to get used to it. Our daughter, son-in-law, and two grandsons are there. The rest of our kids fled Virginia years ago. We’re stranded here in a place that the passing of time has made as comfortable as old shoes. Right now, with the virus raging, the timing for a move is a little uncertain. But life here is getting a little weird. See last week’s post.

I like the feel of Virginia. The Old Dominion is one of the three places, along with Boston and Philadelphia, where American history got its start.  We have Mount Vernon, Williamsburg, Jefferson’s Monticello, James Monroe’s Highland, James Madison’s Montpelier. The American Revolution and the Civil War both ended here. South Carolina? Famous for starting the Civil War.

That’s unfair, sure. And, although it’s true, also beside the point. History hasn’t tied us here, it doesn’t tie anyone to anyplace. People who will spend their lives here won’t do it because they’re sharing in the story of their surroundings. Same with the old timers in South Carolina and everywhere else. We all have our cultural inclinations: highly unlikely someone who grew up in Alabama surrounded by friends and family will one day decide to move to Vermont. Other things matter. Folks who don’t like cold look to escape to warm places. Local politics may chase people, though not likely to a distant state. The other things really come down to work, health, family. When those things push us, moving is easy.

What’s hard is looking at the options. Regardless of age, what we’re all looking for, move or not move, is decency, tolerance, a steady state for the balance of our lives. Sandy and I know this transplant to South Carolina is our last best shot.

Right now the virus is dictating the decency of life everywhere. Virginia is battling back, reporting fewer cases and deaths lately, as people wear their masks and take care in public places.  In the Trump/red states, Texas, Florida, Arizona, covid is tearing out of control.

Is state leadership smarter in Virginia? Probably. We have our 10-percenters who always do the wrong thing. Some Yankees see only politics. Talk-show polemicists insist that many southerners risk infection to show they’re loyal Republicans: no masks, no distancing, all-out at the bars and the Trump rallies. They have demolished the quality of life of the places where they live, the argument goes.

Is that so? That’s the easy presumption: that southern and western states opened early because they’re more concerned with business and a tough-guy sort of freedom than protecting health. But that’s wrong, completely wrong. The same thing happened in Michigan, Wisconsin, New York. It happened in L.A., it happened in London. The pool parties, the bar scenes, the unmasked crowds showed up everywhere.

It happened in those places because people want to belong, to be with others like themselves. Just as true in Virginia as everywhere else. Here we paid attention to the experts. In Texas, etc., state and local governments let human nature have its way. Ignoring sound medical guidance was colossally stupid. But they did what people wanted.

The point is about belonging which, let’s face it, includes going out, having a good time, with the bright lights, the music, the good-looking gals and guys. When I was in my twenties Mickey Gilley put a point on it with “The Girls All Get Prettier at Closing Time.” Years later Toby Keith followed with “I Love this Bar and Grill.” Belonging, when you’re young, is about going out, rubbing elbows and shoulders. It’s all a little fantasy, as the music tells it. Nothing about covid-19. You can’t drink wearing a mask. It’s what we do, what we all do—or did.

That’s a digression: “opening up” in Texas, etc., also let infirm seniors toddle off to the buffet and the barbershop.

We’re in a different universe, but not so different. Belonging matters for us, too. But our kids are far away. Our “guest” bedrooms, the beds neatly made, have become silent spaces, cheerfully, lovingly fixed up, but silent. Family can’t just drop in. Their lives are filled with work, chores, bills. Life is complicated. For us, that means life is quiet.

Moving away will be excruciating, like tearing off a bandage. Driving away from here that last day will be like a slap in the head—if we can get to that point. The practical problem is overwhelming. We’re looking back now at 42 years of collecting stuff.  This house became a warehouse. Along with the two never-used bedrooms, we have two others disguised as an office and a storage room. Weeks go by when I don’t visit the far end of the house.

I’ve been probing back there, tentatively. I found a dusty folder labeled “Original Orders” that sent me to Marine Corps Officer Candidate School in August 1971. The orders—surprise—were typed on an actual typewriter, with a carbon copy attached. Then plastic model jet fighters our son Michael and I built when he was in grade school, lined up on top of a bookshelf.

I stumbled on copies of papers I wrote in grad school. Copies of hundreds of my bylined articles from magazines and newspapers back to the late 1970s. One of them, entitled “Music City Not Altman’s Nashville,” appeared in the Nashville Banner (long defunct) in 1975 after I moved to Music City. I have a copy of the Marine Corps Gazette from December 1976, and magazines that ran book reviews I wrote. Another piece ran in The Wall Street Journal in 1986, after we landed in Jersey. Still have a copy.

This is the way it is when you hike up your britches to move. Some of it I’ll keep, some will go to the landfill. Keep sifting, shake the dust off, come up for air. Constantly. This is how we learn about ourselves. We’ll probably replicate these collections at our next house. The truth about us may be buried, but it’s there. It’s home.