Hey Spaw,

Goin' on my twentieth year down here. Atlanta is not like Chicago because I've lived in both places. It's still very much it's own character. The skyline is not like Chicago even. As to your points:

"Interesting answer Frank. I too spent twenty years living in the south and would tell other yankees that you had to pass through several stages if you were to be successful in working and living there:

1) Open your eyes and realize that it's a different place. It is not like the north and it doesn't want to be.

When you get to know the people, you find out that they're not that much different.

2) Get over the idea that whatever you were doing up north was right and realize that things aren't the same here. Forget what you knew.

What I learned living in the East Coast, the West Coast and the South is applicable to wherever I go since I consider myself an American first. I agree with Pete Seeger who says "It's important to get along without having to go along".

3) Quit thinking, even for a second, that you can somehow change things to your way of thinking.

You can't do that with anyone, anyhow. But there is always the assumption on a part of some that this is what is trying to be done. Having strong convictions doesn't mean changing anyone else's mind. But having the courage to express them is a distinctly American trait.

4) NOW, sit back and think hard on this----Can I live and work this way? Do I want to?

I don't get it that all Southerners think alike. That's part of the "Dixie" mythology. There are some Southerners who actually supported, for example, the burning of Atlanta.

5) If so, you will now have a lot better time and a lot fewer headaches. Don't try to BE a southerner, just a transplanted damnyankee and admit it. If not, get the hell out and take your ass back to wherever it was you came from and don't make life hard on the rest of us damnyankees who are having a great time...except when we have to explain the likes of YOU!

Don't know if this is directed personally to me, Spaw, but you don't have to explain the likes of me ever. I can do that for myself.
I have never tried to be a Southerner and I'm not a transplanted anything.

BTW where do you live?

BTW Frank........I didn't think you lived in the south. Do you? I mean like I thought you lived in Atlanta.......(;<))

I live in the burbs of Atlanta, not quite in the city.In my time, I have gotten around. I traveled through the South just before the Civil Rights era and got to meet a lot of people from all walks of life.
As a musician, I've traveled a good bit of the country and talked to many people. Everywhere I went I have found people friendly and some less hospitable. I have found people operating under the delusion that what they believe makes them somehow special because they hold certain rules and principles. Others have more humility. I have found courage, love, bigotry, and hatred in every part of the country.

Also, I have found that the South is not as monolithic as some would have you believe. The old myth of "Dixie" is dying hard because of a few die-hards who think they represent everyone down here.

Frank