I went on a trip to Birmingham Alabama to repair old houses, you know, charity. Anyway, the person who ran the trip wanted to give us all the "true southern experience" so obviously part of that experience had to be stopping at a Bojangles Chicken in the middle of but luck nowhere northern Alabama. We get in there and we're immediately met with glares. Now, in the relatively conservative midwest, the girls in our group were fairly modest, gray t shirts, soccer shorts, blonde hair with brown streaks in a ponytail, one girl had a small nose piercing, but that was no big deal, but for Alabama, oh boy that was a sight to see.
But then, of course, there's me. I'm a 15 year old kid with hair down to his shoulders wearing flip flops, cargo shorts, a Mexico soccer jersey, and a peace necklace. If it weren't for the fact that they were all so terrified of the flamboyantly gray man sitting next to me I may have wound up hanging out under a tree. After being tired of getting dirty looks for about 20 minutes I make a decision, to be the politest son of a stitch you've ever met. I offered to clean off the table of a 75 year old woman who upon first sight of me began praying to the Almighty Sweet Baby Jesus, she replied with the closest thing to yelling "no" as she could handle, as her lungs were weak from singing gospels all day, she and her husband got into their car which had no fewer than 6 "God Bless America" bumper stickers and drove off, probably directly to church.
In the end I only got one, "we don't like your kind here," but I had gotten enough dirty looks to make a Mean Girls sequel. |