Notes from the Hinterland (1)

Dear All,

I'll be the first to admit, this email is long overdue. For those of you who I had promised frequent updates about life in the dirty dirty south, I apologize; communication up until this point has been virtually nonexistent except for the few of you I've spoken to on the phone. If you got this email by accident, or don't want to receive further delta updates, just email me back and let me know.

For those of you who need to be caught up, I am living in a small town called Helena on the Mississippi River in the northern Mississippi Delta. I am, if you can believe it, a middle school teacher here. When I tell you my town is small, I mean what I say - Helena is home just over 6,000 people, and living here makes it seem even smaller. I see my students at the Wal-Mart and make them practice their times tables in line. They follow me around to see what I buy. The check out girls will often ask me "How did you like that DVD you bought three weeks ago," at which point I pray that they aren't talking about the Sex in the City DVD I bought for a friend that one time. (You never know who knows who here. And everybody here knows who I am because I don't belong.)

Just to give you an idea of how isolated I am here, I can drive 3 miles outside of Helena in any direction and be in farmland - cotton, soybean, or the occassional sunflower field (for quail hunting, mainly). Directions to a local juke joint in Marigold, Mississippi according to the man at the grocery store were as follows:

"It'll be cotton / soy / cotton / soy / cotton / soy. Then, all of a sudden, there'll be corn! When you see the corn, take a right and look for Christmas lights."

These were much more detailed than the directions I had received earlier that day to the same juke joint:

"Drive for about an hour towards Marigold, but turn right into a driveway before you get to Marigold. Then listen for noise."

Po' Monkey's - the juke joint in question - is a suspended wooden shack in the middle of a cotton field off of "Highway" 1. The ceilings are reinforced with garbage bags. The floorboards feel like they could collapse beneath your feet. The walls are decorated with drawer liner, stuffed animals (covered in plastic, oddly) old polaroids, and plastic Bud Lite banners. The "bar" consists of a fridge full of domestic beer and a giant jar of pickles. While Po' Monkey's is one of the original delta juke joints, it doesn't get too much action any more. But every once in a while, someone will be passing through - B. B. King for example - and will decide to stop in and play a set.

I have officially become a small town girl - a schoolteacher in a small town nonetheless. I am no longer Ravina, I am Ms. Daphtary. Most of my students live within walking distance of my house. I know every teller at the bank. My landlord's mother-in-law brings me venison meatballs on Sunday evenings, and his brother tends to my circuit breakers when necessary. I recently served as a judge at our town's annual Barbecue cookoff (which was an honor - Helena folks take their barbecue very seriously). The only entertainment I have access to is a blues club 35 minutes away, the casino, or Central High School football games. And yes, I buy clothes at Wal-Mart.

Nonetheless, I am learning a lot by living here. The people here are perhaps the nicest and simultaneously the most racist people I have ever met in my life. Oddly, the white population has accepted me as an honorary honkie, and I do not have to deal as openly with all of the issues that face my black counterparts. Most people just think I'm mixed. Some think I'm "Exican" (the "M" on the sign for the Mexican restaurant in town has falled off, so many of my students are confused about the actual name of the nationality). There is a substantial white population in Helena, but you would never know it if you looked at the public schools here. The middle school where I work has exactly six white students. The high school has even fewer. The white kids live in the hills where all of the nice houses are, and they attend private schools and church schools. It makes me feel slightly uncomfortable seeing so many white people (especially white children) at the Wal-Mart, because it is the only time during the week that I see a substantial number of them in one place here. Odd especially because my school in Philadelphia was almost entirely white.

I live in big old house on a hill that literally divides the white neighborhood and the black neighborhood in downtown Helena. No one with money really lives around here - my house is one of the few that is not on the verge of collapse. I drive Tevin Randall, a 7th grader, home every day and am amazed to find his house still standing when I pull in. I was sure after the hurricanes hit - Katrina and Rita - that the wind would have blown some of my kids' houses away, but I find myself continuously surprised here at the resilience of everything here. People and things that should have collapsed decades ago seem to still be functioning. The poorest kids live in the projects on the other side of the levy just near the river, about four blocks from my house. The regular poor kids live in my neighborhood. Nearly everyone at my school is poor - it's just a question of how poor.

I'm not sure exactly how I should end this; I am in an odd mood this week. My kids are so smart. My kids are so smart and they don't have telephones. They don't have stables houses. Parents. Clean clothes. Rides to school. Decent meals. Healthcare. Access to a library. I still don't know how they do it.

A quote - from off the bathroom stall at Ground Zero Blues Club in Clarksdale, Mississippi:

"The Mississippi Delta: where cotton is king, corn liquor is queen. Every night is Saturday night, everyday is payday. Two vacations a year - 6 months a piece. The richest land, and the poorest people."

From the home of deep fried pickles and "unsweet" tea,
Ms. Daphtary

My favorite lovebugs!