LETTERS FROM HOME: KNOWING THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THE ORDINARY

June 6, 1996

Dear Danel and Doug,

DC's old friend Tony is visiting from the Bay Area this week. We took him to Meramec State Park to see the 100-year-old graffiti in five million-year-old Fisher Cave, and then we canoed down the Current River amongst a convoy of inner tubes bearing people with beer cans in their hands.

He proclaimed the river relaxing but wonders how people survive here in semi-rural mid-America, where we make do with no Peet's coffee, no Thai restaurants, no appreciation of polenta, no cultural gestalt that manifests in the form of soaring architecture, world-class museum shows and an intellectual buzz in the coffee houses.

"Why would people want to live here?" he asked as we zoomed through the emerald countryside between Eureka and Van Buren.

I said something about wanting to live in nature and something about wanting to be in a place where you know you belong. Not sure that meant to him what it means to me.

In Tony's questions and comparisons, DC and I could hear echoes of our own misgivings about moving home. She says you did lots of eye-rolling when she worried about the supposed lack of exceptional shopping, the dearth of opera openings, the predominance of buffet-style dining.

Tony's visit has made her think of a Chinese proverb: "As the river, all things return."

Tony is very particular about food. Questions every waitress about how the meal is to be prepared. We walked out of a restaurant in Van Buren because he refuses to eat food served on a steam table.

Obviously he didn't have a Southeast Missouri dad. Their answer when it comes to questions about food is "Just eat it!"

Yes, we've been exposed to more cosmopolitan environments, and so have many who now call Southeast Missouri home. Why do they want to live here as well?

Both DC and I have concluded that Southeast Missouri is a good place to grow up, no matter what your age.

We've got a river that runs through us and a culture held together by biscuits and gravy.

Tony grew up in Southern California, where the references are Disneyland, smog, suntans and glasses that hide your eyes.

He has found more he values in Northern California, especially the magnificent city where he lives. He has a dog and a house and a good job, and exact likes and dislikes.

One of my favorite poets is Rumi, who lived in Persia many centuries ago. "You are the unconditioned spirit trapped in conditions, like the sun in eclipse," he says.

When Tony's love, the beatific Angela, arrived from her conference in St. Louis, his big-city limits seemed to fades. Angela is an arts manager in the Bay Area, and interested in most everything except snakes.

She loved canoeing on the Cache River (no snakes), she loves Hank and Lucy, she loved slopping around in the rain at the cabin and she loves cheesecake (My Daddy's).

Angela knows the significance of the ordinary.

Over the past few days, Tony has said he likes the way people spread out here and the loving care they take of their lawns. He still doesn't like food that has done time on a steam table.

We'll give him time.

Love, Sam

Sam Blackwell is a member of the Southeast Missourian news staff.