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Blogs by Marge B. Fulton
Crazy Quilt
9/5/2008 4:50:12 AM
A crazy raft of characters in a small town.
Kentucky was the happy hunting ground. Shawnee, Cherokee, and others crossed our piece of the Applachian mountains in search of game. The place where we live was once a wilderness and in many ways it still is. Untamed, unspoiled and unencumbered by conventional thinking. On the fringes of society you can say or do what you want. Quite often, the really bizarre people here get all the media attention.
Last week I saw a man walking near Food City. His clothes were all tattered and he had a black hat on. I guess it was a hat or it could have been a black rag. He looked like an ancient Johnny Depp kind of pirate. I wondered if this was the man people say lives in a cave down from Wal-Mart.
You never know who you will run into these days. In the next county years ago, there was a woman who everyone said had gone mad. She drove her car in the nude. This vixen wanted to get stopped by the cops. I wonder if she wore a seatbelt.
Most small towns have them; crazies in our quilt. In the city you don't notice these folks. You don't dare look them in the eye in the subway station. They could be anybody and become nobody.
Here in small town America, those wild characters add local color. They have a name. Like a three legged dog, they defy the odds. I love the stories about people who do crazy things. There is one I ran across about a black man who worked in the old hospital many years ago. When a body sat up in the morgue, they say he ran down the hall and jumped out a window to his death. Others say he didn't die. The legend has many variations.
The term "Urban Legend" is well known. Country or rural legends are often obscure. In the country, you can sometimes get away with things and people respect your privacy. We have elbow room and apply elbow grease.
The man who lives in his old station wagon and has even put skirting around the bottom, is not seen as down and out. He is independent and resourceful. He seems more like a cross between John Wayne and Dustin Hoffman. He is just another piece in our crazy quilt.
Our happy hunting ground is alive and well.
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More Blogs by Marge B. Fulton
• Chew the Fat - Wednesday, January 21, 2009
• Alphabet Blog - Tuesday, December 23, 2008
• A Mountain of Praise - Friday, December 19, 2008
• Despite the Black Ice - Friday, December 05, 2008
• A Book in the Hand is Worth Millions! - Thursday, November 13, 2008
• WKCB Interview - Sunday, November 09, 2008
• Book Sales in a Small Town - Friday, November 07, 2008
• How Do You Like Dem Apples? - Wednesday, November 05, 2008
• Holy Smoke! - Monday, November 03, 2008
• The Deep Blue Sea - Friday, October 31, 2008
• Glimmer in Appalachia - Saturday, October 11, 2008
• Floody-Floody - Wednesday, October 08, 2008
• You Betcha! - Tuesday, October 07, 2008
• Feast of the Mind - Saturday, October 04, 2008
• Legos and Life in America - Thursday, October 02, 2008
• Main Street Revisited - Monday, September 29, 2008
• A Rebel With a Cause - Sunday, September 28, 2008
• More and More Credits - Friday, September 26, 2008
• Evocative T-Shirts - Thursday, September 25, 2008
• Lighting My Fires - Wednesday, September 24, 2008
• Writing is Like Apples - Tuesday, September 23, 2008
• On Making a Book Trailer - Sunday, September 21, 2008
• A Tap on the Back - Friday, September 19, 2008
• September is that Magic Wand - Thursday, September 18, 2008
• Thoughts from a Coal Town - Tuesday, September 16, 2008
• Boss Hogg in America - Monday, September 15, 2008
• Safe from Storms - Sunday, September 14, 2008
• The Invisible Forces of Nature - Friday, September 12, 2008
• Buying the Farm - Wednesday, September 10, 2008
• My Subject Becomes Palin - Wednesday, September 10, 2008
• Stimulus Check - Tuesday, September 09, 2008
• Overnight Trip - Sunday, September 07, 2008
• It Pays to Have a Dog - Friday, September 05, 2008
• Crazy Quilt - Friday, September 05, 2008
• Drill, drill, drill! - Thursday, September 04, 2008
• Head in a Box - Wednesday, September 03, 2008
• Greasy Beans - Tuesday, September 02, 2008
• Under the Grip of Gustav - Monday, September 01, 2008
• Too Many Meatballs - Saturday, August 30, 2008
• The Up and Up - Thursday, August 28, 2008
• Trees Turning Too Soon - Monday, August 25, 2008
• Proofs and Peaches - Friday, August 22, 2008
• A Little Corny But.... - Wednesday, August 20, 2008
• Over 500 and Rolling - Tuesday, August 19, 2008
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