Cultural Immersion in Southern Hospitality on Superbowl Sunday

There are a handful of things in life that will reach across any schism, over any divide to unite people. Some are moments of extreme sorrow – tragedies like those the AmeriCorps works to reduce – some are moments of extreme delight; in this case, football. As I’ve stated before, I lived my whole life prior to AmeriCorps (excluding a few vacations) within the borders of Connecticut. One of the most compelling motives for my joining the program was the opportunity to travel and experience the cultures of all the places in the U.S. that I had never visited. 


Well, consider those cultures experienced! In Connecticut I had enjoyed some remarkable Superbowls and their parties; yet those memories are nothing like my Superbowl spent in Louisiana. The story starts about a week before the event, when I had gone out for a run around the neighborhood. I was a few streets away when a woman called out to me and asked whether or not I had seen her dog. I had, it was sniffing around a few houses back, so she and I walked back and worked together to catch the energetic thing. Along the way we talked, and when she heard that we were a group of young men and women doing community service for America who wouldn’t be able to watch the big game on any kind of a TV, she was outraged. The remedy? She invites all of Water 5 (my team; all of whom are complete strangers to her) into her house on Sunday night to watch with her family as the Steelers and Cardinals clashed. Not only did they make us feel completely comfortable jumping and shouting as the ball raced first one way, then the other, but we were treated to QUITE an abundant amount of home cooked Cajun recipes. 


This is just one of the many examples of Southern hospitality we’ve experienced. We’ve had people arrive on our doorstep during the evening bearing anything from a vat of crawfish and king crab to listings of all the Mardi Gras parades we “simply can’t bear to miss!” We’ve been treated to dinners and movie nights by locals as thanks for what we’re doing. 


This is more than a skip and a hop from Connecticut’s culture. This is entirely different from Austin’s. This is Thibodaux, Louisiana, and I would just like to say ‘thank you’ to every single member of the community that has made an effort to feel at home in this new environment. If the AmeriCorps has proven anything to me, it’s that - given a cause, whether it be building the walls to a house being constructed or football, people will find the common ground and, upon that ground, raise monuments. 


As Springsteen reminded me during that phenomenal half-time show, I’m out here “working on a dream” - but I’m not alone. I’m not alone, and with these united efforts and causes there’s no way we won’t see those dreams coalesce. With the mindsets of different people from different cultures working towards the common goal of alleviating our nation of its burdens, it’s only a matter of time until those burdens are overcome and reduced to a nightmare from the past. 


Now, I have to stop here - I’m dirty from constructing the frame to a house’s wall on our worksite today, and I have to get ready for a potluck we were invited to attend by yet another local. Thanks for reading.