What SHE put up with! I was a Midwestern mind-set mail with built-in prejudices against the South --- and its women. I thought the educational systems in the South were backward (they are); the thinking was so thirty-years-ago (it is); and that all its people were slightly "nuts" for staying there.
I learned something about the grace and beauty of Southern charm; the strength of women who can only be compared to "pioneer types"; and the warmth of the South and its many passions. I was so arrogant and conceited about the superiority of the North (and yes, the Midwest). And I was mostly venal and short-sighted.
I needed to grasp the "heart" -- the "soul" of the South; which lies deeper than all the stereotypes. And that "soul" loves the land, and people, and slow-time in everything. Those are its characteristics.
How did Sheila Nassif Mrochinski put up with me all those years -- I cannot even imagine it. Even though I lived it.
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