Nashville

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Party Like It’s 1999: My Ten Year Class Reunion (Fort Payne, AL)


Last week as I mentioned to people here in Nashville that my 10 Year High School Reunion was coming up on Saturday, I was surprised to hear more than a few respond with, “Well I’m not going to mine. Everybody I want to see or talk to from high school, I already do. Most of those people I didn’t like then, and so I know I won’t like ‘em now.” Not one tiny part of me can relate to that statement.

On the same token, there have been times when I have hyped up an upcoming event in my mind for weeks or months, only to find my high expectations were not met. Again, this was not at all the case.

Ultimately it comes down to the fact that the Fort Payne Class of ’99 is a special group of people. Yes, I am being bias.

If the definition of a true friend is someone you can be apart from for years and the next time you see them, you can just pick up where you left off last time, then I have more friends than I realized. Because that was the case with everyone that was there.

I saw how warmly my wife was accepted by everyone there. (It actually reminded me of when I introduced her to my family a few years ago.) How often an official introduction wasn’t even necessary. Just straight to conversation like an old friend. That sort of instant familiarity with a large group of strangers is rare.

Ten years can definitely change people in a way I hadn’t considered; by bringing them to a more similar place in life than they were in before. Kristin Bailey Gardner works in journalism, whereas I am jealous that she is. Kim Thomas Clowers married my 2nd cousin, meaning we’re related now related and see each other at family reunions. And the should-be action movie star Morten Maaegard, the foreign exchange student from Denmark our senior year, was in the same parts of Thailand as I was in 2004. (He actually flew in from Europe for our class reunion- that is impressive.)

When an event this big goes so right, I have to take a look at why. Aside from a bunch of cool 28 year-olds all truly wanting to be there, a lot of it had to do with the planning. Tabitha Thomas Greenwood found and followed a formula that was flawless. First, during the day, we met at the new city park. That was a way that those with children could bring them and have something for them to do as the adults caught up on life.

Then that night just us adults met at an old yet restored hotel and restaurant in the crafty/artsy neighboring town of Mentone. Our senior yearbook was placed on a table along with a memorial of the four we’ve lost since graduation: Grant Dobbs, Derek Hood, Brooke Craig, and Joey Kean.

It was like a big house where after dinner we could just walk around and hang out as the band played. That was the ideal casual environment that kept everyone comfortable and in good spirits.

I have heard of class reunions where people had to pay $100 just to get in. Ours was affordable, practical, fun, and perfectly planned. We could have met in the Santa Fe room at Western Sizzlin’ (or The Sizzler as it’s known in the rest of the country). But no, the Fort Payne class of ’99 does things right. We knew not to play around with something as monumental as our one and only 10 year reunion.

There definitely is a dream-like quality about seeing so many old friends again after so long. Like a blurry Vaseline-on-the-camera-lens kind of feel. And because so many truly looked the exact same as they did in high school, it was kinda like a dream where we all just appeared in the same place and the only thing that really changed was the time in between the last time we were all together.

Eleven year reunion, anyone?

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Why Everybody Loves Taylor Swift (Plus, Does Taylor Swift Have a Heart Tattoo on Her Foot?)

This is the year of Taylor Swift.  America loves her.  Not just 14 year-old girls twittering about New Moon.  What is so universally likeable about this 5’11” Pennsylvania native?  She’s truly different.  She’s herself.  And she’s kinda dorky.

She’s normal.  Down to Earth.  And most importantly, genuinely humble.  And for a mega-celebrity, that makes her stick out.  In a very good way.

I have so much respect for Taylor Swift.  Not because of her clever songs which she writes herself (which is extremely rare in Country music) or her superstar status.  But instead, her extreme maturity for her young age.  And her sincerity.

 

And while much of old school Nashville sourly balks at her success, there is a reason she has made it this far at age 19.  She has the ability to connect with other people.  No matter how well a song is written or performed, it’s the feeling that a listener can relate to the artist and/or the song that causes popularity.

Her character was epitomized during that pivotal Kanye West moment.  She didn’t defend herself.  She didn’t get angry.  She didn’t cry.  She didn’t run off stage.  She just stood there.

And while she has allowed the media around her to poke fun at Kanye’s actions in her presence (SNL and the CMA Awards, in particular) she hasn’t bitterly belittled Kanye West via television or Internet.

 

That’s not what we are used to seeing.  That’s different.  That’s unique.  That’s class.  She set her self apart from everything artificial we could assume about someone in the entertainment industry.

Last night I tuned in to watch The Office but instead of that being on, NBC had a special about the most intriguing people of 2009.  They saved Taylor Swift to the very end.  In her interview she explained that she has always been herself and how important that is to her.

She’s right.  That’s a lot of why so many people are drawn to her.  (She sold on Madison Square Gardens in literally one minute.)  She’s real.

Taylor Swift doesn’t have to sell her music by dancing in skimpy shorts while pretending an ice cream stand is a dance pole at a strip club.  Or kiss Madonna at an awards show.  Or try to be edgy in any way.  She doesn’t have to try to be anything.  She just is.  Herself.

She’s just Taylor Swift.  And despite her outward appearance and her talent, she has a dorky side that shows through.  That vulnerability and humbleness intrigues people.

Authenticity is hard to come by.

Bonus: Does Taylor Swift have a heart tattoo on her foot?

 

The answer is no.  It’s not real.  She explains in this interview that is was drawn on to entertain the idea of getting a real one.

 

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People are the Meaning of Life, Part 3

 

I’ve always tried to imagine what it would be like to spend all day at an amusement park and not have to wait in line. Not because I got to pass everyone to the front, but because there were no other people there other than the people I came with.

And with all the annoying traffic I have to deal with everyday as I drive through Nashville, I’ve thought about what it would be like to be the only one on the road.

And when I go to Starbucks to read everyday on my lunch break to read, would I be able to truly escape if there were not the roaring mumbles of everyone else there?

Our lives are filled with people who mean a whole lot to us; those are the ones that make up the main cast of characters.

But there are also the extras, the people with no names or stories. Just the muddled cardboard images of characters that serve as background noise and decoration. They keep our lives from being a ghost town.

Of course it works both ways: I’m just another wallflower to them as well. I serve no obvious importance or benefit. But if they are People Watchers like I am, maybe as they wait in line near me to get coffee they try to figure out my story.

 

What could these strangers tell about me as they take a look at my 10 year-old battered Birkenstocks? When they hear me order my coffee, does my voice match me the way they had envisioned it? Do they think I’m weird for ordering a solo shot of espresso over ice instead of a blissful $4 milkshake of a coffee?

But a few minutes later, we’re no longer standing in line together. They leave and drive away. Most likely, I won’t cross their mind again. I simply gave them something to subconsciously think about as they waited in line. They were entertained by me without me ever even looking them in the eyes or speaking a word to them. I am an extra, just as they were to me.

Even the extras add to the meaning of life.

 

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I Was Born in a Small Town

While movies we watch tend to portray life in the “big city” because it’s more practical to film in larger cities, I would say that the settings of Country songs portray what life was like for most of us while growing up, whether the hometown is in the South or not. In fact, I can’t really think of anyone I personally know who grew up in the heart of a big city. Small towns and suburbs seem to be much more relevant to America as I know it, compared to the city life I grew up seeing on John Hughes’ movies set in Chicago (like The Breakfast Club and Ferris Bueller’s Day Off) and Saved by the Bell which was set near Los Angeles. Somewhere between Seinfeld and Little House on the Prairie is the setting of my real life.

Spending my first 18 years in Fort Payne, Alabama, it seemed everyone I knew pretty much knew everything about me. Actually, I should say that everyone knew everything about everyone. There was no avoiding it. I graduated in a class of 183 students, most of whom I knew from at least Kindergarten. Their parents had seen me grow up. We pretty much all went to one of four main churches (either Baptist or Methodist).

Just saying the name “Fort Payne” has the same connotation to me as the word “cousin” or “aunt” or “1st grade teacher”- people who knew me as a kid that cried when E.T. had to leave Elliot to go back to his home planet. People who I could never try to act too cool around- they simply know me too well. That’s what my hometown is to me.

And that’s not a bad thing, at all. There definitely is a unique comfort in a home town. Hence the word “home”.

Back in February, my wife and I had a free weekend so we decided to spend it at a free bed-and-breakfast in Fort Payne (my parents’ house). We noticed how quiet and peaceful the city is. The opposite of the life we often know in Nashville. My wife wanted to take a driving tour of the place, so since I had already shown her the tourist spots (the canyon and the waterfall) I decided to drive her around the neighborhoods I spent time in.

As I drove up the big hill where we as Cub Scouts had a box car race, I saw my friend Alex Igou’s dad working in the yard. My wife was amazed that he knew who I was right away and that we talked a good 10 minutes before we went on our way to get some coffee at the local coffee shop. Which is owned and ran by my other friend Alex Pate’s mom. While there, the other customers who came in also greeted me by name. That caused my wife to say, “Do you know EVERYBODY in this town?!”

Pretty much. Nearly all 13,000 of them. Or I would least be recognized as “Jack Shell’s boy”. I learned that the same reasons an 18-year old kid was ready to leave his small hometown on Graduation Day became the same reasons I found the town endearing today, ten years later.

The town that for a brief time in 1989 held the record for the world’s largest cake. The town that the Country music super-group Alabama put on the map. The town with the self-proclaimed title “Sock Capitol of the World”, which is proudly displayed on the green Fort Payne City Limits sign with the word “capitol” being misspelled. Maybe one day they’ll finally fix that sign.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_Payne

This article was posted in The Franklin News of Franklin, TX in July 2009.

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Christianity and Wine

Wine not?

Taboo is an interesting thing. As the opening line to the theme song of the classic inter-racial sitcom Diff’rent Strokes goes, “Now the world don’t move to the beat of just one drum: What might be right for you, might not be right for some.” From the society of a small family, to a town, to a nation, certain collective behavioral beliefs help unify a group of people to identify as one, bringing a sense of safety in numbers as well as vindication that their own viewpoint really is the best one.

As I researched for my epic “Beauty and Self-Worth aren’t the Real Issues, Lack of Will Power Is” last week, I learned some interesting things about food and drinks that are considered taboo by certain cultures. For example, throughout the centuries coffee has been banned by different countries (including our own) and religious groups (at one time Catholics and currently Mormons). Caffeine is an addictive drug and many people have seen coffee as a controlled substance, as it causes its consumers to become dependent on a drink that can change their demeanor simply by its consumption or lack of it, after the tolerance is built up.

 

It’s hard to imagine that drinking coffee (and other caffeine-laced beverages like tea and Red Bull) would be taboo to anyone. But considering its addictive qualities along with its mood-altering and heart rate changing abilities, it does have some similarities to alcohol, which is more easily condemned by religious groups. Muslims, Hindus, Rastafarians (though they encourage/require marijuana use), and Mormons are the most solid in their shunning of alcoholic beverages.

As for Protestant Christians, it’s namely Baptists and Methodists that have a stance of little to no tolerance for alcohol, often stated in their church by-laws. (Being that my hometown is almost completely represented by Baptists and Methodists, the sell or purchase of alcohol was illegal in the county until 2006.) However, because of their proximity to the Catholic Church, Episcopalians and Presbyterians tend not to look down on alcohol consumption.

 

Being Baptist my entire life, I always thought it was weird that Catholics actually drink wine during the service, in particular for the Lord’s Supper. Obviously Jesus and his disciples drank wine for the Last Supper, but we always used Welch’s grape juice (a company that got its start by offering non-alcoholic grape juice to the American Christians who saw drinking wine as sinful). After high school I moved away from my “dry” hometown and graduated from a one year (Baptist affiliated) Bible college in Florida then earned my English degree from Jerry Falwell’s (openly Baptist) Liberty University in Virginia, both saturated in an “alcohol is taboo and prohibited” culture.

Then I moved to Nashville.

 

An interesting crossbreed between churches and bars. A culture where drinking beer is in the same category as drinking soda. In other words, it’s just another beverage. Like in Europe. And I quickly learned that judgmental attitudes towards alcohol were nowhere to be found, even in Baptist circles. A person could actually sincerely love both Jesus and beer. In fact, last Fall my Sunday School class took a tour of Nashville’s own Yazoo Brewery as a fun activity.

When I finally accepted the fact that alcohol was no longer a moral issue to me, a revelation I had was this: Alcohol use does not necessarily equal alcohol abuse. Before, my mind saw any consumption of alcohol as an instant link to drunkenness and alcoholism. That is a stigma that has since been dissolved from my mind.

An interesting exception to the alcohol ban in Christian circles is best expressed in a quote I would always hear from my friends growing up: “My parents don’t drink, except for a little wine on their wedding anniversaries.” The alcoholic content of the average beer is around 5%. However, wine typically starts between 12 to 15%. Why was strong wine overlooked for special occasions but weak beer condemned?

 

There are several reasonable answers to this paradox, just like there are many understandable points on why certain religions prohibit alcohol. And because good cases can be made for both acceptance and rejection, it’s remains taboo for some and completely normal for others.

Ironically, the same parts of the Bible that caused me to believe alcohol consumption was wrong before, are now the same verses that give me confidence that for me, it’s no longer a moral issue. In fact, some of the best spiritual growth I’ve done in my entire life was during the time period that I figured this thing out for myself. Whereas before I was either too young to drink, banned by my college, or a part of a culture that shunned alcohol, the independence I found by sorting out my view on the issue helped me become aware of the spiritual side effect that a “no alcohol” lifestyle had on me: I was secretly judgmental of those Christians who drank.

But in the classic case of “if you can’t beat ’em, join ’em”, I realized that I had been treating the issue like some of the Jewish leaders did the law of Moses. They judged Jesus for healing sick people on the Sabbath. Even though the law more generically instructed the people to make the Sabbath day a time of rest and remembering God, the Jews stretched this and in their own interpretation added to the law, stating exactly how many steps a person could walk on the Sabbath, considering anything more than that to be work, therefore breaking the law of Moses. Judging the people by a higher standard of the law than God actually gave to the people.

 

I allowed myself to believe that the wine of the Bible was different than wine today. Because that excused Jesus of drinking it. And that helped me better accept the fact that Jesus’ first miracle was turning the water into wine at the wedding, and that he knew enough about wine that he might the good kind, and people at the wedding noticed it. But even if there was less alcohol content in the wine of Biblical times, it couldn’t have been much less. Jesus drank real wine. I finally stopped judging Jesus and others for it. And once I joined the crowd, not for reasons of peer pressure but because of personal conviction, I realized my walk with Christ matured.

 

Now I know that a person can have a daily personal relationship with Jesus, can read and study the Bible, can pray for others, and appreciate good wine and beer, because I have become that person. After daily praying for years that God would show me my flaws and my sins, my prayers were answered when I, in a sense, took real communion for the first time.

_________________________________________________________________________

Here are some excerpts from Paul’s letters to the church in the book of I Corinthians regarding eating food sacrificed to idols. These are the quotes that have bounced around in my head as I’ve established my own beliefs regarding food and drink:

“Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and that you are not from your own? For you have been bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body. (6:19,20).”

“But take care that this liberty of yours does not somehow become a stumbling block to the weak (9:11).”

“For through your knowledge he who is weak is ruined, the brother for whose sake Christ died. And so by sinning against the brethren and wounding their conscience when it is weak, you sin against Christ (8:11,12).”

“Whether, then, you eat or you drink or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God. (10:31).”