First, the story is Southern in point of fact. Just like The Scarlet Letter is Yankee in point of fact. Let’s not forget the “thing.”

Every worthwhile story is concrete. I once read a story with characters named Boy, Dog, etc. and it was just annoying.

Yet the same stories also exemplify universally human problems and characteristics; otherwise, they would not be about humans.

As Francis Schaeffer pointed out, Don Juan wanted to find Woman by knowing many women; but one can only discover the riches of Woman by sticking with a woman.

Cultures do develop characteristic traits. This means, individuals grow into expressions that have features influenced by those around them, so that group traits can be spoken of without denying individuality.

So, the story is characteristically Southern in many ways. This doesn’t mean that strands and themes are not also present elsewhere; but it’s also hard to imagine the exact sequence and script “working” in New England.

We could have debated whether I was fair in generalizing that packing off to an old folks’ home is typically Yankee. Though I think it is fair as a generalization, it is only that; it does not apply to each individual in either region.

There is much that is admirable about the Yankee in his finest form: the tidiness, the diligence, the earnestness, the properness, the reserve in personal interaction. We will celebrate stories that bring those out as well.

Amanda might have asked where we were from before going on about belles and gentlemen. That not-asked is one mark of a Yankee. The answer, if the question had been asked, would have marked another irony of her whole approach.

“Men and women are the same everywhere.” This statement needs to be unpacked. If you mean that we are all fallen sons and daughters of Adam, then, of course, you are correct. But if you mean that all cultures produce similar men, you are not. This is obvious in such cases as dress, language, and food preferences. But more than this, some cultures tend to produce better men than others. Cultures that have for many generations been saturated with reformed Christianity produce better men, by and large, than those that have not. To deny this is to deny that Christianity has any effect on how men lead their lives.

I maintain that the South was (and to some degree still is) a more Christian culture than the North and, thus, tended to produce better men. Are there exceptions? Most certainly. Your father, for example. And there are plenty of cases of the southern opportunist.

You may demur, but let’s at least get clear on the thesis.

And I am sorry that you resent my comment. My statements may be controversial, but they are not intended to be offensive.

Yes, a wonderful movie.

The sheriff, Richard Bradford as you mentioned, plays a small but significant role in the film. His duty is to make sure Mrs. Watts gets picked up by her son, Ludie. But since there is some time before Ludie arrives he drives her out to Bountiful, her hometown. His simple grace and gentle demeanor capture so much of was is lost and almost forgotten in the South. In the Yankee value system, his time would have been better spent doing something “productive.” But in the Old South, or in this case the vestiges of the Old South, time was not considered a commodity.

Andrew Nelson Lytle summerizes the agrarian value system of Old Dixie:

“[T]he farmer knows that he cannot control time, whereas he can wrestle with space, or at least with that particular part which is his orbit. He can stop, set, chaw, and talk, for, unable to subdue nature, it is no great matter whether he gets a little more or a little less that year from her limitless store. He has the choice of pleasant conversation, the excitement of hunting, fishing, hearing the hounds run, or of the possibility of accumulating greater spoils.”

In the case of the sheriff, he chooses the simple kindess of helping a stranger get back to her childhood home where she can relive her life, her joys, her sorrows, her regrets.

The sheriff had a choice between “productivity” and kindness. Given these alternatives he told “productivity” to go to the devil. Let us follow his example.