I am from Kentucky and I am NOT illiterate.

[ieoeja]

43. I am from a farm in southern Indiana, and Republicans treated me like shit.

I moved to suburbs of Chicago in the mid '80s after graduating college. The suburbs were clean, orderly, quiet, and authoritarian. In other words, everything a hillbilly farmboy wasn't. It was also universally Republican. I spent two years in suburban hell being looked down upon and just generally treated like shit.

Then I moved into the most liberal area of Chicago. Did they welcome me because I was like them? No. That would be impossible. The area was too diverse. There was no "norm" to be like. They welcomed me because they welcomed everybody.

Actually, they welcomed me more than most because, as a hillbilly, I almost spoke english.

I'm a hillbilly so I get to tell that joke. In fact, we didn't have running water when I was really young. So I'm more hillbilly than you. But that did not stop us telling Kentucky jokes in southern Indiana!

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I'm not kidding about that "suburban hell" thing. Those were the two most miserable years of my life. Constant insults, fights, etc. The only people I got to know well were the police. It isn't strictly illegal to walk around the suburbs, but it is apparently highly suspicious to the police.

As my Black-Scottish-Mexican-Apache son found the first time he went into the 'burbs by himself. Took him an hour to walk from the train to his friend's house. It wouldn't normally take that long, but the police stopped him 6 times that hour.