Love Day

I am a native Hoosier…DeKalb County. I was visiting an army buddy in St. Louis a year after we had been sprung…he was going to Missouri, Columbia campus and I was taking courses at “The Stench”, in those damn trailers they used as classrooms. IPFW was a fun place.
Anyway, we hit some bars by the river … Muddy Waters was one place, and everyone drank Busch beer. Not Budweiser…Busch.
As the rowdiness kicked in, one called another a “hoosier.” This was an attention grabber..”I ain’t no goddam hoosier, you blankety-blank!!”
So I piped up, “I’m a Hoosier!”
All eyes turned towards me and smirks and tiny little head shakes unnerved me.
My buddy, Bill, said “you’re no hoosier…a hoosier is a greaser-dumb ass who can’t do anything right.” As in, “damn! You damn-straight hoosiered THAT up!”
It was later on I discovered the history of “Hoosier”…I am sure you folks know all the stories…but not a lot of Indiana residents know that in St. Louis a hoosier is the WORST thing one can call another.
As a kid I grew up around KY-TN refugees who left the hills for northern Indiana factory dollars.
We were taught to shun them and call them hillbillies. And to be called a hillbilly was the ultimate insult we fired at our comrades.
Mom would have none of it…we had some KY natives living in a rental house a mile away as neighbors…they had about six kids and the old man kept getting fired and the kids were hungry about half the time, I suspected.
One older boy worked baling hay one day and was lugging a large can of baked beans home.
I remember Mom asking what he had in the bag as he trudged the road…
‘a can of beans! I love beans…we can’t afford them but we’re havin’ ‘em for supper tonight!’
Ok…I know…sounds like bullshit…but I am fairly ancient…we had an outside privy and our SCHOOL had an outhouse too!
I went to a 2-room school, eight grades, two rooms.
One day Mom had a weiner-roast…chips…oh yeah, BEANS!…buns, relish, ketchup, mustard…Pepsi Cola.
Big deal, right? She invited the “hillbillies”.
The joy in those kids’ eyes and the “thank yous” from that bunch of sweet children…well, I’m tearing up now…it was such a tender moment, I had the pastor tell the story at Mom’s funeral a few years ago. “I wish you was MY mother.” And that is a direct quote from one of those little boys.
Happy Valentine’s Day.