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Self-loathing in a small town
06/02/06
by Shaw

In the past, on this site, DJ has given his perspective on foreign lands (England, Ukraine, Israel, Finland), and I have written about places closer to home (Western New York I and II, Nashville, Montréal). Today, I am writing about Everytown USA. John Cougar Mellencamp has a song about small towns. It is called, creatively, "Small Town".

Educated in a small town
Taught the fear of jesus in a small town
Used to daydream in that small town
Another boring romantic thats me

But Ive seen it all in a small town
Had myself a ball in a small town
Married an l.a. doll and brought her to this small town
Now shes small town just like me

The lyrics above underscore the literary genius of JCM--his use of colorful language and metaphor to really paint a picture of his subject are astounding. Wait, what I meant to say was those are the stupidest lyrics I have ever read. Jesus, what a horrible song. I hate John Cougar Mellencamp.

Anyway, you've heard the expression: "a big fish in a small pond." The overachieving student/athlete makes good, leaves his small town, where he is the star student, the sports hero, the ladykiller. He gets a scholarship to go to the big city, to the real world, the the private college. The whole town turns out to see him off, and they all know that he will be the best, the greatest. They know it because he has always been the best; the world he lives in is his inferior. The town's eager son heads wide-eyed into the big city and to his shock discovers there are millions more like him, just as smart, just as strong. He toils to keep up and makes a name for himself, but he is not special... not, that is, until he goes home and is greeted by his old-town admirers, gathered in a throng at the train station to welcome home their hero.

You've also heard the expression, "Boy... you ain't shit." Unfortunately the second one is the more apt to describe my "homecomings." But that's another column.

I am back home for a few days right now. Yesterday morning, I went to the store to get some things. Where I live, there are two places to buy things. "In town" (2 miles down the street) there is a small grocery store, pharmacy, Dunkin' Donuts, and pizzeria. In Kingston (20 miles away), there is everything else. I chose "in town" to get my supplies. Of course I ran into my mom there. This is perhaps not so strange. I entered Dunkin' Donuts to get a coffee, and was mercilessly given the "hon" treatment, e.g:

Maybe this is normal... if the woman behind the register is like 70 years old. This woman was maybe 30, which means she is basically my age. Somehow this just doesn't seem right. When I left the store, I happened to notice her name tag and, I kid you not, it said "Honey Sue."

I went back to the same Dunkin' Donuts about 8 hours later to get decaf coffees for me and for my father, and got the hon treatment from a different lady, this one in fact about 5 years younger than me. Her name tag? "Baby Sue." This is also not a joke.

It seems like the number of people with the word "Sue" involved in their name, either as a first name or a middle name that is used as part of their first name (e.g. Donna Sue, Nelly Sue, Honey Sue, Baby Sue, etc.), is a pretty good indicator of the remoteness of a town: if the town has about a 2% Sue rate, it's probably a city or a suburb of a big city, and probably Northern. If there's a 10-15% Sue rate, you're probably looking at a more rural town somewhere in the midwest. Once you hit 20%, you're in the South or upstate New York, and at least a 90 minute drive from the closest airport. If you don't believe me, look up Donna Sue on google images. I swear those people all live in my town. I would have put us at a local Sue rate of 10%, but after yesterday's encounters, I might bump it up to 20%.

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Shit. I started off this column intending to talk about the way movies and TV portray small towns and compare them with mine. I screwed up. It's deadline time, there are already a few paragraphs written, and nowhere have I mentioned a single movie or TV show. Let's rip the bandaid off and get this over with fast. The most prominent instances I can think of recently are the small Wyoming town in Brokeback Mountain, and the random New England shore town that Vito goes to in The Sopranos. But these portrayals are so disparate that I can't think of any unifying theme to tie them together. There is really just nothing common between the two. Oh, I know!



Awkward Mustaches

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