Southern Snow and Southern Sprit Soars

Getting slammed by snow, ice, and freezing rain preceeded and followed by temps in the teens when you're in the South is the setting for a disaster of mammoth proportions. True the states north of the Mason Dixon Line got a lot more snow and true their temps ran a lot lower, but consider what the south is and what the north is. That is UN-prepared and PRE-pared!

That doesn't mean the south is slow or lacking in wisdom.It simply means that preparation for something such as a slamming snow and ice storm is outside the southern jurisdiction. But then, that is where some of that gracious, cozy, warm and fuzzy Southern living style comes in to play, too. That is where the Christian spirit of those nudging close up to the Bible Belt gets lived out. For example....

..... in Birmingham, Alabama, folks were stranded for hours (I mean somewhere around seven hours) in their cars. No food. No water. Just stranded. These folks don't know the preparedness for getting stuck in a snow storm on an "interstate parking lot" like folks north of the Mason Dixon line do. Northern folks know to carry some food, water, and survival blankets plus flares and flashlights. But when push came to shove, there was a restaurant (fast food, chicken) manager that decided to cook up hundreds of sandwiches and biscuits and pass them out to those stranded. He opened his restaurant to anyone who wanted to crash inside. No charge for anything!

He walked up and down the road, slushing and crunching on the snow and ice, delivering hot, fresh chicken sandwiches to hungry and thirsty.

...... and then there were the stranded teachers and students in schools in Atlanta. They couldn't go anywhere. Folks couldn't come get them. Buses couldn't run. But you had the faithful teachers, administrators, and staff that comforted and consoled the students while they wiled away the hours waiting to be rescued. Then the Governor called out the National Guard to come to the rescue. And then there was a baby born in the freezing grid-lock that was the interstate parking lot (and I believe there just happened to be a nurse stranded nearby, too). 

Now would all of this have played out in the north as well as the south? Probably so. But sometimes you just have to brag a bit on your Southern "cousins" down around Birmingham and Atlanta for being there and doing the right thing.

Now about doing the right thing...... "go and do thou likewise."