Longer languid days, wisteria, and barbeques herald in once again the beginning of one of the most curiously intriguing and oddly entertaining of southern phenomenons: dating in the south.
No one rivals a southern woman in her expertise in the hunt, capture, and inevitable destruction of her prey, as evidenced by the steadily increasing pile of wedding invitations on Scarlet’s desk. Always anxious to follow decorum, I consulted a regional expert in southern tradition for fashion advice on what to wear to an upcoming nuptial event. Having been married herself four times already, she paused, looked me in the eye, and simply replied: “Darlin’, I wouldn’t know what to wear to the wedding- I’m normally the bride.”
The hunt and capture, to the best of Scarlet’s ability to ascertain, is accomplished through no less than a carefully crafted military CIA operation that little southern girls are taught by the age of three. By the age of twenty three, the scrappiest little southern alley cats from a town with a population of forty-three can land a millionaire and divorce him, leaving skidmarks as she coos “bye ,bye”, waving his wallet at him as she drives off in her Mercedes convertible.
The arrival of a newly single man in Birmingham is followed and tracked by single women with greater precision than hurricane tracking. Upon hearing of his impending arrival, single women caucus and plot an immediate investigation, and before the moving truck arrives his employment history, the annual report to the stockholders of his business, the make and model of his car, and his real estate holdings will have been disseminated like fresh meat into a piranha tank.
If an unidentified single male walks into one of the traditional neighborhood establishment bars, there is a woman at the bar, perched on guard at all times. An immediate chain of reaction is set into action whereby the valet is notified, who promptly produces a report on the make and model of his car, the tag number, as well as the presence of car seats (or lack thereof). Upon receipt of a satisfactory report, the guard sends out a mass email to all of the single women in Mountain Brook and Vestavia, who will then begin arriving in numbers that outrival midnight madness at the mall.
The more technologically savvy gals will follow the man’s progress of his divorce on AlaCourt, mark the date of his trial on her calendar, and then appear on the courthouse steps wearing spanx and false eyelashes with a basket of homemade baked goods to greet him as he leaves the courthouse.
Ah, Love. It’s enough to make Scarlet’s Yankee male companion gag more violently than a bowl full of grits. Once again, I had to consult our very own Anonymous for some down home advice-and for once, even Anonymous could not shed any insight, as his own dealings with southern women as of late have left him dazed and underwhelmed…so as always, when presented with the insurmountable, he opened a bottle of Don Baltazar Cabernet Franc, and suddenly the problem seemed to disappear like a sunset over the magnolia trees in June.
Cheers y’all.
(Did I say that??)
Until next time,
Scarlet