First I was a preadolescent substitute janitor at a specialty magazine, in a gloomy old three-story house near Vanderbilt where Dad and other men (only men) chronicled the enforcement of Brown v. Board of Education and pounded manual typewriters and mostly just wanted me to empty their ashtrays.
This volume helped set the course of the Press. It helped cement our reputation for publishing important, vital scholarship. All the beautiful words in it were devoted to celebrating and eulogizing the legacy of the white supremacist South.
By the time I moved to Nashville, I had laid the groundwork to not immediately sound like I was from New Jersey, if I wanted. It also left me open to picking up a Southern inflection or two. Do I say “y’all” every now and then? Sure, I do.
My mother has dementia, but her old friends in no way shunned or ignored her. She was clearly happy to be there among them, and she said over and over again what wonderful people they are. There was no talk of politics, race, or religion within my hearing.
