Wednesday, August 21, 2002
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Wednesday, August 21, 2002 |
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Which one is better: the North or the South? By MICHAEL
BOYLAN
Last week, while political candidates were storming our lobby, I was taking my annual vacation to Massachusetts. Each year I travel back to my hometown and visit friends and relatives with my wife. This year was fun as it featured a visit to the beach, shopping in the coastal town of Rockport and a lobster-and-steak dinner poolside. What I found very interesting during this trip, though, was what was on the pages of The Boston Globe's editorial pages last week. It seems someone recently wrote a column about which place was better, the North or the South. Citizens wrote about the pros and the cons every day and more Globe columnists chimed in during the week. As a former resident of Massachusetts who has now lived in the South for close to 10 years, I have seen both sides and believe I can judge them both fairly. The first thing that should be weighed in determining which is the better place to live is cost of living and the South wins, hands down. Houses are inexpensive and plentiful, gas is cheaper (though not by much), and it is still a lot cheaper to go to the movies down here than it is up North. It is hard to justify going to Adam Sandler movies when they cost almost $10 a pop. People up North tend to get paid a little more than their counterparts below the Mason-Dixon line but not enough to justify a $200,000 difference in house prices. I feel the next important thing to factor in to the ultimate decision is weather. The North has seasons, which is a good thing, but one of those seasons is winter, which lasts from November to April, and that is just wrong. The South is known for its stifling heat and humidity but it is also known for air conditioning everywhere. Last week it reached 101 degrees in Boston and you had to find stores that advertised air conditioning on their doors to escape the heat. The next factor that people tend to weigh in on is the people of the region. Some would say that people up North are pushy and rude and people down South are polite and nice, while others would say that people up North are passionate and genuine and people down South are dimwitted and fake. I believe this category is a push, although I am tending to find the Northern accent more irritating than a Southern drawl. Now, because I'm running out of space and ideas, it is time for the lightning round. Football is better down South because it takes up an entire weekend from high school ball on Friday to pro on Sunday. High school teams tend to play on Saturday afternoons up North and, other than Boston College and Syracuse, college football stinks up there. The food is better up North as there are tons of independently owned restaurants and many ethnic neighborhoods. If you tell a Southerner that you want some food from Greece they send you to the Varsity, which has the greasiest food in the South. Traffic is better down South because we actually have more than two lanes per side of the highway and our road projects get completed in the decade that they were started. Up North, if George Washington rode his horse down the street while looking for a tavern, that road must never, ever be changed. Public transportation is much better up North, though, as it actually takes people from all suburbs of the major city and goes to places that people would want to go to, instead of just a straight line toward nothing much. Up North there are beaches and mountains within an hour of each other; down South there are not. Up North, ice cream stores are seasonal; down South, you can get an ice cream cone whenever you want. Up North, Southerners are rednecks, while down South, Northerners are Yankees though both places have an almost equal share of both. So, this whole controversy just comes down to personal opinion. Each region has a lot of history, a lot of community pride and a lot going for it. A person could be happy in either place and it just depends on what they are looking for. You see, there really is no region better than the other, although the East Coast is way better than the Midwest and I think we can all agree about that. |
