Stop the Train I want to get off.

I have this very intense love-hate relationship with the South.

(sneering with a French accent) You see, I was booorn heeere. In the pretty part of East Tennessee. And then my parents moved to Seattle and my real life began. Okay, there is real life in the South too. And there are things that I love beyond all reason about the South. And while I'm on a positive note, I'll just tell you one.

The Husband and I got married in May of 2004. We did the wedding and the honeymoon and it was lovely. After we got back from the honeymoon he decided we would join some friends for tubing down the Chatahoochee river in N. Georgia. I had never been tubing before because I am (or was, I'm not so sure anymore) a cultivated human being.

We got suited up and rented tubes and headed out to the head of the tubing section of the river. The Husband plopped down into his tube like the trained professional that he is and I hesitated like the wise-beyond-my-years woman that I am. The Husband is sweet and so so playful so he was dragging his left hand on the river bottom to slow up so that I could catch up to him. I gradually descended my elegant behind into the inflated tube and as I was inelegantly paddling to catch up to him and our group I see his face drop. He holds up his hand. The hand that was now missing the new and very dear wedding band. My face drops. We both hop out and he returns to the entry point where he is rapidly joined by three of our friends. They sift the bottom of the river looking for the missing band. I'm sitting on a rock trying not to obsess about what a bad omen this is and also trying not to cry. The four boys are quickly joined by two more. And then two more. And then two more. Strangers were stopping to help the dear Husband search for the missing band. And as they searched many more were looking at me and hearing the story of what had happened and shouting back, "Don't worry, little Lady he still loves you!"

We didn't find it. The poor Husband searched for a good 45 minutes...maybe an hour, but the titanium band was the same color as the bottom of the riverbed so how was he supposed to find it? People up and down the river tried to be encouraging. It was one of those days where everything that could go wrong did. The water was cold and the air not warm enough yet to compensate, the ring was lost, the Husband entered a new dimension of foulness and I was obsessing obsessing obsessing about the lost band and how to replace it. And yet. Those dear Southerners reminded me that the things that matter most can't be lost on the bottom of a river and that the lasting part of our marriage was in the inter-tube next to me. As I watched the group of people searching get bigger, I shook my head repeatedly and thought, "Only in the South." And I believe that I'm right. Only in the South would total strangers stop to help a young Husband search for his missing wedding band. Only in the South would a total stranger take you in and feed you (this is another story for another time). Only in the South do people speak like rednecks, but act more graciously than most human beings.

I had intended this entry to be comical. I was going to tell the story of my dear Mama-in-law and her protestations at some of the choices of her Son. But I think that this story is better. The Mama-in-law story is funny, very funny, and I will tell it. But for now, for this one moment right here, I love the South.