Remember "Sweet Home Alabama?" In which Reese Witherspoon escapes her Southern roots (Alabaman, specifically) by becoming a fashion designer in New York? She forges ahead by forging her past and like every well-to-do romantic comedy, Reese reconciles her disdain for her humble roots with her big city ambition with the help of a chiseled boy with eyes that sparkle.
As a tenth grader who long dreamed of life in Manhattan when I was older, I ran out to see this movie on opening night. I have been told in the distant past that Reese's character and I had some similarities. I almost always brightened at that suggestion but smoldered when I realized that she was a total SNOT in 95% of the film.
I myself have had to resolve the pluses and minuses of living in each location, the benefits and drawbacks to both houses and apartments, languid drawls and clipped intonations. Dare I say it? I've got some pride in my Southern upbringing, thanks to nearly 9 months of city life.
So excuse me if I bristled a bit at the following incident. I was asked by someone, a PEER NO LESS (she's my age, down to the college graduation date), where I was from on account of- surprise!- my faint accent. "That's so cute," she said when I told her. (Meanwhile, she hails from California, much geographically distant that my own hometown.)
Cute? Really? To me, and I really don't feel I'm being overly sensitive, that word implies a certain frailty and gentility (sometimes) that has overcome the depths of one-room schoolhouses, dirt roads, outhouses, and passing out in the heat. Now I've come close to losing my composure on a Memphis morning in July but have you seen "Steel Magnolias?"
Add it to your Netflix queue behind "Sweet Home Alabama." I do love Dolly, and Reese, of course.
For more boning up on Southern transplants in Manhattan, read my friend's article, "Homecoming Queen," from NYTimes.
