Our Brother in Mississippi

I’d start off by telling you how our brother ended up living far from New York, and just how he picked Mississippi, and just how much he sounds like he grew up there. I’d tell you, but I can’t explain it myself.

Dusty (the name he goes by, if not the one we call him) and his long-time girlfriend Christy live in a large house, two bedrooms, two baths, full kitchen, large living room, big porch. We were there four days before I realized it is a double-wide, which really changed my viewpoint on trailer living. When we three sisters went down to Mississippi to see him this past September, it was the first time any of us had seen him in about 25 years, and the first time in about 45 years that we had all been together.

I can’t really explain Mississippi. It is a state poor in money, but it is rich in artistic talent, in musical talent, and in beauty. We all flew into Memphis (and I was thrilled to actually be “Walking in Memphis, walking with my feet ten feet off of Beale”), but we spent all of our time in Mississippi.

Dusty has never met a stranger, just friends he hasn’t met yet. I never realized how true this was until he walked over to me in a museum to introduce me to his friend – only to have the man, who had held a door open for me a few minutes previously, announce that he had met me before he met Dusty. It takes me a few months to make a friend, it takes Dusty a few seconds. So everywhere we met, we met his friends. Some of them were friends of long standing, some new, but all of them were interesting.

Take when we stopped in the main square of what seemed to be a deserted town. A few minutes later, we were being greeted by a renowned sculptor, who gave us a private tour of one of his two studios. There were some pieces that took my breath away, including a bust of my brother, possibly the last person in the world I ever expected to see immortalized in bronze. I was very impressed by the sculptor’s work – even more so when we saw one of his pieces at the Delta Blues Museum.

One friend of Dusty’s even drove up from New Orleans to document our trip. That’s like a full day’s drive, round trip, for a stay of just a few hours. You don’t find that kind of friendship and loyalty just anywhere.

One of the many highlights of the trip for me was our side trip to Jackson. A two hour drive (each way) just to go to a weekday Mass might seem excessive, but not when you know that the Mass will be said by the beloved Bishop Kopacz. I am the only one of the four siblings who is still a practicing Catholic, and it meant a lot to me that they all took the journey with me.

Music, artists, museums, great Greek food -- Mississippi was so much more than I expected it to be. Everyone said “Why are you going to Mississippi?” My answer now is “Why haven’t you?”

Oh, and if you don’t know the story of Emmett Till, look it up.