A foreigner everywhere

“Ever since then I have believed that God is not only a gentleman and a sport, he is a Kentuckian too.” The Sound and the Fury

Only a Kentuckian—or someone who understands Kentuckians deeply—understands Faulkner’s quote. I saw the quote misused by a Kentucky militiaman, though, so maybe that de-bunks the theory, but, really, it takes some knowing Kentucky to get your mind around that one.

When misused, the militiaman from Fort Knox meant that it is an upstanding and prideful thing to be a Kentuckian, which it is, but that’s not all there is to it.

Kentuckians are contrary. We want to be called Hillbillies when it’s convenient, and, by God, we’ll load our double-ought shot gun and level it at your head if you call us one when the time ain’t right.

If God were a Kentuckian, he’d play both sides of the Civil War (which we did). If God were a Kentuckian, he’d hate his brethren and outsiders with the same vehemence, while embracing them tightly and offering them sweet tea and time to sit down a spell (which we do). If God were a Kentuckian, he’d be suspicious and wary of even his favorite neighbor, but he’d trust his governor to lead him to salvation directly without once questioning the plague of nepotism or patronage.

I do not intend to insult God or Kentuckians, but do you see the pattern here? Kentuckians are contrary deep in their blood. They’re cool and breezy and casual, but deadly serious about horse racing and corvettes, race relations and patriarchal lineage.

I’m from Louisville, Kentucky, an island of society that belongs nowhere. Louisville won’t have a thing to do with the rest of the state because “we’re not like those hillbillies.” And the rest of Kentucky won’t have a thing to do with Louisville because “they’re not like us hillbillies.” And the rest of the country regards Louisville squarely as part of Kentucky, which it isn’t, and so it belongs nowhere. Sovereign to nothing.

Louisvillians resent everyone but other Louisvillians because they can’t trust that an outsider will understand how precious it is to be a Louisvillian by birth. Louisville is the cultured, tasteful, polite and sophisticated spot in the morass of Hatfields and McCoys and Muhlenberg Counties. Someone from Ohio once said to me, smiling broadly, “Ah, Louisville, the gem of Kentucky.” No one had ever surmised my hometown so succinctly in my life. A gem, yes, but still, a gem of Kentucky soil, tainted both by its heart’s wish to be perceived as untainted and its desire to belong to the rest of state—when it wants to.

Outside Kentucky, distinctions of Louisvillian or Kentuckian are meaningless. When I moved out of state in 1998, I always said, “I’m from Kentucky, but not that part of Kentucky.” After years of trying to explain that I am a gem of Kentucky, I have learned to accept my contrary identity and say just, “I am from Kentucky.”

But, just like Faulkner’s God, I’m still a charlatan. When it’s convenient, I still pretend to be a hillbilly and a descendant of bluegrass fiddlers. My husband always says, “But you’re not from that part of Kentucky.” He’s right. I’m not. But I am this time because I say so.

I’m from nowhere and I’m from everywhere because my home is from nowhere and from everywhere. It is everywhere worth knowing to a Lousivillian, and nowhere worth knowing to a Kentuckian. In the South, I’m suspiciously northern. In the North, I’m suspiciously Southern. In the Midwest, I’m just a rube, a hillbilly come to Chicago.

And so Faulkner’s God is a Kentuckian. A sophisticate, a backwoods dirt farmer; urbane, hillbilly; suspicious, accomodating. From everywhere, from nowhere. Contrary.

Addendum 2/22/07: It also means God has a perverse and possibly cruel sense of humor, but that's just too long a post to explain. Take my word for it, M-kay?