On book tour I cannot wear that uniform. Driving toward Greenville, South Carolina, the first earthly stop on a book tour that will occur largely in cyberspace I’m wearing a white pleated shirt and a long black cardigan and black leggings and pearls. There’s a diamond band on the fourth finger of my left hand and there are flat black suede driving loafers on my feet. I am unied up in a kind of preppy propriety crossed with Johnny Cash outlaw country chic, that some how fits, because it stretches, this round brown lady, who migrated from Motown to Music City.

             In the back seat, there’s a black and white Hermes Scarf, decorated with silhouettes of dancing couples moving to the elemental American dance hall sounds. The scarf is there “in case I need it.” Right now that means in case we go to some fancy restaurant in Asheville or Cashiers with a country club vibe.

              Right now I’m wondering if Oprah wears Hermes scarves anymore or if she gave up on them forever after they shut her out of the flagship Hermes store in Paris.  I am hoping Hermes apologized to Oprah and Oprah forgave Hermes. I am coming to believe it is impossible to over rate civility and that every possible reconcilliation even the seemingly trivial should be attempted. Rudeness is never petty.

             There are three things that  I like about Hermes  scarves. One  is that one size truly fits all. The second is that most of them tell a story. The third is that one tied around your knew or purse or hat can turn an outfit from Target into something vaguely appropriate to wear to the fanciest ladies lunch or cocktail party and one if you don't loose it can last you a lifetime.  Hermes scarves are a kind of sartorial all access pass.  It’s no wonder that a kind of prosperous middle-aged women, white and black, love them. There's a certain strength and freedom in a uniform. And a kind of balm and Gilead. I believe this world can use all the strength and freedom and balm it can get.

             Saw a poll on the internet  this week about the new-about-to-be-african-america Disney princess. Most people thought the complaints much ado about nothing. I'm not so sure. I think the new African-american Disney Princess maybe  a step in the wrong direction. A gaffe. Why, oh why, after waiting all of these years, does the brown princess have to be a cook?  Why isn't she a poet and a free person of color? And if we think the answer is because there were no poet free people of color in New Orleans at the time, even when we know there were isn't  that exactly why she should have been a poet. And why doesn’t she fall in love with a black prince? And strangest to me, most of the other princesses live in fantasy worlds, fairytale worlds,that provide a kind of reprieve from reality. Disney's black princess lives in something very close to the real world. Hmmm. Pondering this. Hope you are too.But when she arrives let's welcome her civilly. Let's introduce our daughters to her thoughtfully. Let us acknowledge the multiple meaning of the singular text.

            On the roads that connect Greenville, South Carolina to Nashville, my husband and I stop in Oak Ridge Tennessee, a hard working serious town, not in one of the dreamy villages, my black and white silk scarf gets to stay in the back seat. Once upon a time Oak Ridge was home to atomic physicist Werner von Braun. My stepfather claimed to have worked with von Braun. He used to say that von Braun would compare research protocols in America to those in Germany frequently starting off, "When we were in Germany," until my stepfather said, "When you were in Germany you were planning to blow us up." Life is complicated.   Back then Oak Ridge was known as the secret city.  Today it's, well it's hard to say what it is. It still feels like a secret city. We ate in a funny little restaurant called the Buffalo Mountain Grille. Elk and ostrich are on the burger menu and they scare me like the buildings with not enough windows scare me. I tell the waiter that I am afraid of mad cow disease and he brings me fried shrimp.
        Looking for the Buffalo Mountain Grille we  stopped at a local hotel to ask for directions. We ran into a wedding party. It seemed to be before the wedding/ Pictures  were being taken.The bride was in white with a bouquet and bossy,  the bridesmaids were in jewel tones and following orders. Three guests, two men and a woman, were a glass wall away from the bride and her maids smoking cigarettes. The older of the two men had a flower pinned to his flannel shirt in a way that suggested he was a member of the wedding party. The three smokers were talking about a new young artist, a tattoo artist it turned out. The older man said, “we bought her, her autoclaves” and it was a conversation I had never heard before, except the pride in finding the new best one , that was familiar. The woman said, she was tall in jeans and high heels of some sort of drapy black acknowledged she had had a few tattoos but in a way that suggested the young tattoo artist might have a new customer. The younger man, he looked to be near thirty, had  a baby boy hiked up on his hip. The baby boy was holding his own bottle. It was a picture of how my South is changing. Young women are respected tatoo artists with autoclaves. Daddies hold the babies at weddings. Inside the glass, near to the bride,  a handsome young military man, crisp and composed, sat in a chair utterly serene.  I wondered if he was supposed to be wearing his hat on inside. I thought they didn’t.  Then I thought that very adult thing—what do I know?

             Eventually we made it to Greenville. Eventually we wandered the streets of what felt to us on a halcyon Sunday a truly post-racial city in the new south. Eventually I was charmed by Greenville's riverwalk and Greenville's restaurant excellence and it’s polite and welcoming people. Eventually we make our way to a local barbecue joint and I find this message written in the bathroom stall. “This is the good life. Honkytonks. Boots. Rebel Flags. 4x4’s. Brooke was here.“ After that there was a date in August of this year, a date two months ago.

            So much depends on what Brooke means by her evocation of the Rebel flag. Is she waving a flag of defeat or defiance? Or is she simply acclaiming her freedom?

            Prickly as our world might be, I believe we’ve gotten to the point it is best to wonder, when we hear others making confounding declarations, what it they are truly saying to us, according to their lights and according to our own. We have come to the place where it is time to make true a new promise: Your dreams do not have to come at the expense of my dreams. We will find a way to coordinate.

            All that rainy Saturday  while we were on the road I thought of a Lucinda Williams'  song, Greenville. I don’t know which Greenville she’s writing about. But I want to believe it ‘s the up country, South Carolina. I want to believe it is the  hyper-romantic Greenville where I was told I was an okra pick.

              Rebel Yell was picked by SIBA the association of Southern Independent booksellers as one of the important southern books of fall 2009.  That’s a dream coming true I didn't know I had. Good bless the southern booksellers. Heroes going out to support visions of the south other than their own.

              Just as I was coming to believe that earnestness is the new irony, I was given a glossy synthetic green sash to wear over my black twin set and sensible black knit skirt. And so it was with mixed tone I was reminded that appreciation of absurdity is the prerequisite of maturity. It took me half a century to get to my first pageant-girl moment. Any earlier and it would have been wasted on me.

             Far away from pageant girl moments are Lucinda and Emmylou moments. Coming off a driving trip I’ve been thinking about place name songs, particularly Greenville, Lodi, and Crescent City. When I was struggling with the writing of Rebel Yell I would hum myself to sleep with the tune to Lodi. The relevant words go, “things got bad and things got worse”…”oh Lord, stuck in Lodi again.”  Then one day I got unstuck. The book got finished. I was off to Crescent City.

            A friend of mine will be making hundreds of bourbon to help me celebrate this third novel.  She will make the bourbon balls by substituting Jack Daniels into a rum ball recipe. She will make the easy kind of rum ball you make with chocolate and crushed vanilla wafers or crushed gingersnaps. We are busy women. I found our recipe on epicurious. If you want to be part of this book launch across the distance make yourself up some bourbon balls and listen to Emmylou sing Lodi then listen to her sing Crescent City.  Receive that good ole country invitation, come home with me.