Tall Tales of East Tennessee

East Tennessee is a remarkable place. Unlike any other place on this green earth. A visitor may be not appreciate, nor fully understand the mysterious and wondrous things that happen here. The life of a rural community in Appalachia not easily comprehended by the outsider. We baffle, though don't mean to. We're just a little different.

For surely nothing commonplace ever happens in east Tennessee.

Not since the pioneers settled here. We got a pie-eating contest that started around the Civil War and it's still going on. We got band festivals, football and basketball games, country music concerts to attend. Conway Twitty, Elvis, Hank Williams wake us and Roy Ackuff, Dolly Parton, Minnie Pearl, Bill Monroe put us to bed.

We aren't fools enough to believe the news. We barely believe the sports. We watch television, often with the sound off. We drink buttermilk, eat grits with a fork and don't care too much for sleeping late. If we get up after seven o'clock in the morning, the birds pretend they don't know us. The scrambled eggs and bacon don't taste as fresh. And we can't find anything in the house. Not our wrist watches or car keys or billfolds. We're lost.

We wear our best clothes on Sunday. We go to church. Our next-door neighbors are the Good Samaritan. We half-expect to look out our living room windows and see John the Baptist walking down the street. Methuselah up at the old folk's home. He can remember things that happened long ago. Far back, so far back. Why, he can remember when Adam and Eve came to church in their new Studebaker. Somewhere not far off is the garden of Eden. We buy apples, oranges and plums grown there from roadside markets.

When we attend a church picnic we suspect strongly the twelve disciple may drop by. We wonder if they came what they would eat. Granny Batty's potato salad, Jody Marsh's apple pie, Linda Miller's fried chicken, Tilly Post's biscuits and gravy?

We live in the Bible Belt. We hear tell of pretty tall stories. You climb up one of them tall tales you can look out and see Davy Crockett crossing the Great Smokey Mountains and Thomas Wolfe at the train station in Asheville headed for New York City. You can see Daniel Boone, Babe Ruth, Big Foot and General Andrew Jackson, all headed for Knoxville and the University of Tennessee, where a football game is about to start.

We hear now and again reports about angels. How they been seen flying around Greeneville and Morristown and roosting on church-tops. And everywhere wild rumors abound if you don't attend church, angels will fly by your house, knock on your door and when you come out, grab you and fly you to church. They will give you a lift. (And if you should be caught fishing or hunting on Sunday, angels will nab you and take you to church.)

We fish. We don't always eat what we catch. We are fishermen of men, too. Yesterday we caught a big-mouth baptist, a speckled Lutheran, a striped Episcopalian and wall-eyed Catholic with a double-chin. It's all the wrist, you know. See our photos in the Kingsport newspaper. We are smiling creatures. We smile a lot. We don't grin. Grinning is for unsophisticated people. We laugh. We cry when somebody burns the biscuits. Ain't it a shame?

We have the freshest air and the greenest hills anywhere. One whiff of our air and you feel good. You can play the fiddle. You can sing and play the guitar like Hank Snow. In east Tennessee, everybody plays the guitar and sings country music. We're born that way. We sing hymns, too. Those gospel tunes are in our blood.

Sometimes we talk different from other places. We talk twang and dang. We're tall and short and a little hefty around the middle. Some of our best friends are pigs and hogs and cows and chickens. If you can talk to your dog or horse you can talk to anybody. They don't listen to just anybody. You got to communicate. I know a reverend who gets his dog to wash his car, vacuum the living room and mow the lawn. Now that's communication.

We love the Bible. We read the scripture. We believe in the power of scripture. On a cold morning, you read Deuteronomy to a stalled car and up will start. Nothing like Deuteronomy to clean our a carburetor.

The sun over east Tennessee can't decide which town it likes best. So it shines down on all of our towns. Which is mighty fine if you're a farmer. You don't want to live somewhere the sun hides from your crops. And good for the rest of us, too.

Likewise, the stars don't hide from anybody, like they do in some areas of the country. If you stand in the starlight or the moonlight long enough, you will hear a whippoorwill or owl call your name.

We are friendly people. Everyone knows each other. We sometimes feel related even if we aren't. Squirrels, chickens, cows are our cousins. They know us. We know them. East Tennessee is that amazing. And more. The skunks in east Tennessee smell prettier than french cologne. And the bumblebees don't sting. And fish jump at the lake every time a bluebird sings. And nobody burps in public, except a few bullfrogs.

If a jackrabbit crosses your trail, you'll have good luck for a week. Throw a rock at the moon and you'll end up either bride or groom. Spit on a spider and you'll grow up tall and strong. (Have you ever heard a cowlick moo? In east Tennessee, they do.) Jump a bush at the church and you'll never have to worry about money for the rest of your life. Poke a turtle with a stick and you'll turn into a polecat. Find a worm in your apple and you feel like a millionaire. Catch a lightning bug and your future will be bright. Tie a string to a junebug, fly it high and feel like a king. The world on a string. If you find a grasshopper in your backyard and dig right under it, you'll find treasure chest full of diamonds, emeralds and rubies. See a dragonfly and run around the house three times or you'll go crazy.

We sometimes see the shadows of Confederate soldiers resting beneath the maple and oak trees. If you listen real close to our creeks and rivers they will tell you tall tales. If you listen to the wind it will tell you no lies. If you listen to our crickets at night, you can hear them singing 'The Battle Hymn of the Republic.' Or 'When Johnny Comes Marching Home.'

You can just about set your watch to the church bells that ring in our towns. They call us by our names. Ding dong, ding dong. And what does that mean? Church-bells seem to understand us in a way that nothing else does. What are they saying? It's all of human understanding -- ding dong ding dong. All we know. Or need to know. Listen. It's amazing to hear church-bells. They tell us things.

All human compassion. And where ever we go they follow us. Ding dong, ding dong. They touch us lightly on the arm. Pat our backs. Nudge us toward places we don't know. They grab us by the arm, they grab us by the leg.

They won't let go. Church-bells. They somehow get inside us. They want to change us. Make us see things. Make us believe in ourselves.

Of course, sometimes make a "bong-bong or bong-diddy-bong" sound. The sound of a bell has the power to lift the spirit. We are always charmed and amazed every time we hear church-bells. We can't resist their sweet sound. A call to faith, a commence to Sunday worship. We are always delighted and surprised by church-bells. They know how to touch us. They know secrets about us. These church-bells. They enter our ears and awaken our spirits. Strengthen our beliefs.

Yes, we tell tall tales. We don't do it out of a sense of mischief. We just do it. It's part of life in east Tennessee. The big fish that got away, the big white deer grazing on our front lawn, or the snake slain in the backyard by the courageous housewife. Davy Crockett is out there somewhere, hunting in the hills of east Tennessee. If you see him, say hello.