Alien Visitation 7/9/2023

By: Jennifer Richardson Holt

I heard the other day of someone coming to my area for a job interview. They were coming from Canada. I tried to think what it might be like for someone to come from somewhere else like that to where I call home. I know, Canada isn’t like someone coming from some uncharted bit of jungle in the depths of the Amazon basin. I do realize that it won’t be like another planet. But then again, if you are coming from somewhere with a truly different environment, I suppose it could be close to that jarring of a change. As I sit here, I am wondering what my world might look like to someone coming from another.  To someone not used to all things American, Southern, and rural, my neck of the woods would likely be an odd pill to swallow. Perhaps to that someone, I’d be the one in the savage Amazon only with more pine trees and red dirt.  I wonder, what exactly my humble planet would look like to an alien visitor? And by alien I don’t mean a Neptunian (assuming that’s the appropriate term). I mean say someone from Europe, or perhaps Asia, what would a walk in those shoes look like here? Well, of course besides the red muddy footprints.

The initial landscape would probably be formidable.  And yes, I am about to discuss the weather but, since we are currently having a heat wave that’s relatively significant even for those of us who are used to heat, well then it’s something worth talking about.  Just a few days ago I had to be outside for a bit for my job. I had the luxury of choosing at what time of the day to be out and I had chosen as early in the morning as possible. It didn’t matter. The heat and the humidity apparently had gotten up far earlier than I did and was already making a go of the workday.  It was an hour when many people weren’t even at work yet and though I was not doing much manual labor, simply standing outside, it took mere minutes before my skin started to shine. And not in the sultry, glistening southern maiden type of way either before you get any fantastical ideas. I was shining in the disgusting, I can feel sweat trickling down the small of my back and whenever I do get to sit down my whole shirt will be drenched, type of way.  That is not a pleasant feeling when it is early in the morning, and you know you still have the rest of the day to endure. Mainly because that tells you not only is it going to get significantly hotter and juicier, but you will get to carry on with the rest of your workday in the hot and juicy state of your personage. If someone came from a place where going about their life in a giant soup bowl was not the norm, I cannot imagine how traumatizing it would be to experience this unawares.  I reckon anyone not used to being a stew ingredient would find it horrifying.  If I’m honest I find it horrifying and have lived it for over four decades.

Of course, there could be the challenge of language as well. The South is a big place, and every little nook and cranny has its own speech.  Usually, we can understand enough of each other to figure it out, but God bless the outsider that thinks they will come in and just easily translate the locals. There is the chance you may be able to decipher the basics.  There is a reason that television shows about authentic southerners have subtitles. We are often a people of a slower pace of language so it’s possibly you could catch the sentence by the predicate and squeeze it ‘til the subject comes out.  But we shall not give you just a sentence, oh no.  A statement will be decorated with euphemism and metaphor.  An average person may not have a name but will be “that fella who lived down from where Mama ‘nem used to live back before Eugene bought that store on the corner” and this will be expected to suffice in explanation of whom is spoken.  It’s not just people that get this treatment but pretty much every topic that can be spoken of will not remain in its original unfestooned form.  So, if someone from elsewhere could get past the lilt or drawl, the nouns and verbs could still be indiscernible in other ways.

The food will be strange. Glorious, but strange. If one were not used to excessively friendly strangers who smile and speak though they don’t know you from Adam’s housecat, that will be alarming.  The strange obsession of the majority of the locals with a game for which they build massive coliseums they easily fill to revel in this game will be an enigma. People here frequently plan their lives around this game. While I participate in this, even I see it’s a bit…much. An outsider might be appalled. Well, that or fall into it themselves as it can happen before you know it.  The pace of life will be different.  The priorities will be rearranged from places elsewhere. The values held dear may be an entirely different set.  All this unfamiliarity may well be overwhelming to an outsider.  I’ve seen it be as much. But I have also seen it envelope a stranger like a warm embrace and before they know it, non-native lands feel surprisingly like home.