Burning Field in Bolivar County, Mississippi

Now that I no longer live in the Mississippi Delta I am asked frequently about it. The separation from a world I knew so intimately has allowed space for reflection and perspective. In one conversation with a new friend we were discussing myths, and in our exchange it occurred to me that the Delta is a land shaped by myth.

When you live there it’s as if you are surrounded by manifested myth. Over time it’s hard to discern the smoke from the transparency. That doesn’t really matter, though, because living inside a story feels much more exciting than living outside of one. If you’re just visiting, at least you can feign ignorance born from unfamiliarity as an excuse for your confusion. But if you make that land your home, you will find an intimacy that grows in all homes. What, then, is the cause of ignorance rooted in intimacy?

I think it might just be myth. Our desire to turn the unknown into something recognizable - often with a grandeur that just can’t be matched in a place without the saturation of legend - is at the root of so much social conditioning of the Mississippi Delta.

This is why I think so many are attracted to that oval slice of northwest Mississippi. Uncertainty is the foundation of that flatland. It breeds an edge skirting known and unknown, allowing for a thrilling escape from the perceived mundaneness of suburbia. You can fly freely in the smoke of that land of myth, gorging yourself in gritty music, gravel roads, dying towns, secret histories that now exist as much orally as they are documented, and, or course, social legend. So. Much. Social. Legend.

We need these spaces in our lives. We all need a way to drift into and out of various realities - thats what breeds perspective. The danger is getting forever lost in Wonderland without the recognition that you ever even entered it.