Cell Service, and Bellyaching

Recently, I took a trip to Shade Gap, Pennsylvania, the setting for my upcoming novel Revelation 11, to pick up those little details that give stories their texture. I chose Shade Gap as the novel’s setting because of its overall spookiness. A sign on Route 522 cites 18th Century settlers referring to the area in a narrow gap between two mountains as “The Shadow of Death”. 

Shade Gap’s lone claim to national fame occurred in 1966 when a mental patient and self-styled “mountain man”, William Hollenbaugh kidnapped seventeen-year-old Peggy Ann Bradnick setting off the largest manhunt in Pennsylvania history up to that time. Thus, it has all the necessary trappings of the Southern gothic novel, a curse, grotesques, and I’m tossing in a religious cult and a gruesome murder for good measure. 

At this point, I’ve written about 40% of the novel. In one key scene, the protagonist must use his cell phone to record a conversation and e-mail it. When I tried to reenact this feat, I found that I had no cell service. The mountains not only choke off the light, but phone service as well. Guess that scene needs rewriting. 

Undaunted, I set out to meet some locals. Restaurants are great places to catch slices of life and hear local accents and expressions. Since it was Sunday, all restaurants in Shade Gap were closed so I went up the road to Orbisonia and its conjoined twin of a town, Richmond Furnace. Orbisonia’s dining choices consist of the Pizza Star restaurant, that’s it. 

Inside, I witnessed a multi-generational, bilingual family drama. The shop owner, a balding man in his 50s, moved back and forth between the kitchen where his son and daughter worked, and the dining room where his parents sat. The family outnumbered the three paying guests. When the owner sat with his parents, he held his head in his hands and spoke Italian in hushed tones. His father dosed across the table only to be periodically awakened when the mother barked some command to the kitchen in Italian. One of the children would respond quickly to each summons with her glasses, drink or whatever “Nonna” wanted. 

At one point, the daughter complained about some issue in the kitchen. The owner raised his head from his hands jumped up and yelled, “What are ya bellyachin’ about?” Bingo. “Bellyachin’”, I hadn’t heard that term in ages. Rest assured, someone will be ‘bellyachin’ in this novel.

A Personal Epiphany

Having now, foolishly perhaps, styled myself as a Southern writer, I must grapple with what that means. I furthered my education by watching the American Masters episode on Harper Lee. To Kill a Mockingbird addressed an overwhelming American truth by exposing the ways we deal with, avoid, dance around, and occasionally confront race.

I identify with Southern writers due to stylistic similarities and a fascination with the human and spiritual landscapes writers like Flannery O’Connor and Carson McCullers paint with their words and characters.  Harper Lee painted with a more realistic world compared with O’Connor’s and McCuller’s more impressionistic renderings. So much so that throughout the American Masters episode the words ‘clear’ and ‘clarity’ almost became a refrain.

Twice during the show, speakers referred to the Southern Tribe. My membership in that tribe may be suspect. It is certainly tangential at best, but tied in through two parallel connections. I’ve lived in Central Pennsylvania most of my life. Two primary groups settled the area: German immigrants and the Scotch-Irish. The typical journey, sometimes occurring over generations, consisted of arriving at either Philadelphia or Baltimore, moving westward to the mountains and then, usually drawn by cheaper land prices, following them southward. This migration populated the more elevated portions of Virginia, Maryland, West Virginia, Tennessee, Kentucky, the Carolinas, Georgia and Alabama splashing out of the mountains like so much alluvial soil upon Gulf Coast’s plain. So Central Pennsylvania culture is simple an early mutation of what evolved in the South. The main difference being that these European settlers used African slaves to farm those fertile fields.

A scan of the Southern Writer’s pantheon reveals a preponderance of Irish surnames and therein lays another connection. My Irish ancestry with its mystery, secrets, isolation and alienation reflects the worlds evoked by Southern writers.

No Southern or Irish story is complete without an epiphany, a moment where a person sees their shortcomings in such stark relief, they can no longer be denied. I experienced such an epiphany during the show.

Although I claim to be a Southern writer in style, my birth twelve miles north of the Mason-Dixon line to decidedly Northern parents at the height of the Civil Rights Movement imbued me with significant anti-Southern prejudices. As the show discussed how differently people reacted to To Kill a Mockingbird, I smugly listened to Diane McWhorter, author of Carry Me Home : Birmingham, Alabama: The Climactic Battle of the Civil Rights Revolution, describe her journey from certainty that Tom Robinson would be acquitted to being moved to tears following his conviction and death. She then thought, “What would my father think if he saw me crying for a black man?”

Then a square-faced man with a sculpted mane of silver hair and a voice as smooth as butter wearing a conservative blue suit filled the screen describing his experiences during the Civil Rights era. Based on his appearance, voice, and attire, I felt an instant dislike and fully expected to hear him spew some racist diatribe. The Reverend Thomas Lane Butts both disappointed and shamed me as he reflected on his support for integration and resulting conflicts with the Mobile, Alabama KKK. I, too, had falsely judged a man based on his outward appearance. In a Flannery O’Connor story, this epiphany would be a step toward redemption. I hope it is for me.