The Deep, Down, & Dirty South

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Excerpt

The Southern Mystic

I was raised by women who believed in Jesus and could tell the future. The Jesus part was easy. It was as expected as heat lightning on a summer night. We were southern and Jesus ran through our blood like pine sap through the trees. You would think the nature of God would draw more questions for the asking. More back-chilling, spine-tingling mystery but this was not to be the case. That was the black and white of it. The cut and dried. The Family Bible on the table. Prayers called out over food and footsteps. Sunday go to meeting. Jesus was no mystery. Jesus was real. This future shrouded in forebodings and signs of all kinds, now that was the mystery.

Now, the men in the family knew no future other than the day at hand. They were rough and tumble guys. They fished, they hunted, they told lies and alibis. The telling of things to come was not a part of them. Hard work was a part of them. Alcohol was a part of them. They were made up of three parts survival and one part mischief and so while the men stayed grounded to the earth, the women were the mistresses of all manner of things that were a part of food and babies. Of blessings and dinner on the ground. Of signs and wonders. Of dreams and fore-tellings. And the women drank this portion of their cup in without complaint. Carried the burden where it led them. And the men let them carry it on, following from a respectful distance, shuffling on the edge of mystery.

These women of mine could tell things by the weather. By the way wild animals appeared and disappeared. They could call the sex of the unborn by the way a woman walked, could tell if a man child or girl child was coming. They could find a missing husband cold turkey in the middle of the night three cities away, and in some cases, they could tell fortunes. For them the veil between time and distance and other worlds was thin, more gossamer than brick.

Excerpted from DEEP, DOWN AND DIRTY SOUTH by River Jordan. Copyright(c) 2009 by River Jordan. Excerpted by permission of Hummingbird Press. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher