Back in the mid-1950s, I lived with my mother and two younger brothers in a small farming town in Middle Tennessee. I was in the fourth grade.
On any given month, depending on how many old people passed on and how many babies Dr. Sharp, with the help of good Christian midwives, delivered into the world, the town’s population was a little over or a couple under 100. Most all were cut from the same cloth: Quiet in nature. Pragmatic. Hard-working farming families with a devout faith in God and a line they didn’t cross nor allow anyone else to.
It was one of those little communities where pretty much everybody was related through blood or marriage. Old people’s children and their children’s children and their children lived within a stone’s throw from one another. It was wise to keep your derogatory remarks about anybody to yourself. Chances were, the one you were gossiping about was related to the somebody you were talking to. It’s still like that in some parts of the South.
Every so often, someone would take off for the big city, hoping to strike it rich. Not too long later, they’d come back. It just didn’t work out for them. They got married, had some kids and bought a house. Probably from one of their cousins. From then on, they’d stay put.
One lady, known by everyone as Miss Juanita, graduated from high school, went back to the farm, packed up her belongings and left town to try her hand at acting. She managed to get herself a couple of small parts in Broadway plays and did some lunchtime fashion modeling in Manhattan’s fanciest restaurants.