straight talk

A friend of mine once asked me, "Does anyone have anything bad to say about Dolly Parton?" The answer always seemed to be "no," until recently.

On Friday, UT awarded Dolly Parton an honorary doctorate of humane and musical letters. Opinions I've encountered on this matter are in disunity. There are those who believe "9 to 5"/dealing with Porter Wagoner/the Thunder Express/her boobs/etc. alone should have qualified her for the honor years ago, and then there are those who seem to feel this turn of events is some kind of sham. While my feelings lie somewhere between these points of view, I have to say I'm shocked that anyone would attempt to sully such a clearly positive, constructive event. Luckily, the bitchy camp are quiet and few.

It has been difficult to tell what the handful of naysayers are actually complaining about. Perhaps they are concerned that Dolly is going to, by placing "Honorary Doctorate" on a resume or application, land a job she is under-trained for? I would wager that most people are aware of what these degrees signify -- an award to a public figure, a way of lauding a person's specialized beneficence and significance. Or are they perhaps confusing a doctorate with an actual degree in medicine, afraid that Parton is now laboring under the delusion that she is qualified to perform surgeries in a willy-nilly spree across the state? Do keep up, y'all.

Negative gurgles that the honorary degree was given "for no reason" or "for nothing" I have found particularly nauseating. Arguments about the relative difficulty of graduating from UT aside, I will say that I find Dolly more than qualified for an honorary degree in the stated disciplines of music and humanitarianism. It would be ludricrous to list Parton's achievements here, as everyone within shouting distance of Sevier County is aware of her charitable work, and the world is familiar with (what I deem, anyway) one of the most uniquely beautiful singing voices in country music. I will just mention that the woman has registered six hundred songs with BMI. Six hundred! Note: I'm not implying that Dolly is to be canonized, worshipped or otherwise considered inhuman -- she's just a truly good person who has done much to improve the place she lives in, not to mention a badass at music and hilarious. Can't we just keep it a touch positive up in this?

Here is a clip of Dr. Dolly receiving her degree:

http://www.knoxnews.com/videos/detail/dolly-graduates/

(I died over this video, by the way. "Get it?! Double D?!" It is a delight to me that there are still people that still say "get it?!" in earnest after telling a joke. I also appreciate that she pronounces "regret" in such a way that it rhymes with "cigarette.)

the James White Fort of blogging

Hello.

I was born in Knoxville, Tennessee, and I have lived in the area nearly my entire life (possum-dodging in Vestal ‘til age three followed by a glorious return after high school; lean years eating out of styrofoam containers in mouldering Fort Sanders apartments; a drunken Fourth and Gill porch swing tour in my mid-twenties; awkward stints in Fountain City and Colonial Heights; first solo apartment in Park Ridge, located by scouring the classifieds for the vacancy nearest to Chandler’s Deli). Like many from Knoxville, I have also sought happiness elsewhere, at times in more cosmopolitan locales. While I have encountered much awesomeness on this globe (props especially to Bodymore, Murderland and East London), I have never found a place much like this city (or more generally, like East Tennessee). Blame whatever you like, whether nostalgia, hometown pride, or hillbilly/mountain stubbornness, but I have come to understand it as a city imbued with qualities that prevent a wanderer from ever disengaging entirely. Those that leave Knoxville usually feel a protectiveness over it (just look at Knoxblab!), and they typically boomerang. I am no different.

I have heard Knoxville get guff from haters both within its borders and without – from ambivalence about the South in general in NYC to delusions of adequacy in Nashville, from protestations that we are Yankees (perish the thought) in Baton Rouge, to the familiar sound of native complaint (typically heard from a fixed position under a duvet on a West Knoxville couch) of a nebulous want of “things to do.” To these naysayers, I say DING DONG, YOU’RE WRONG (except the latter, to whom I say “move,” to be interpreted variously as "_____ your ass and do something about it", or "_____ to a shitty metropolis and develop an expensive cocaine habit").

I will be the first to admit that my city is imperfect. However, and at risk of using words like “homespun” and “rustic” (or worse, invoking the moniker “Scruffy Little City”), it is often Knoxville’s very inelegance that endears it to me. It is a work in progress, like all of us that are worth knowing, and a project worth getting behind.

That’s why, every goddamned day, this will be a blog about the city of Knoxville, Tennessee.

Your humble servant,

Marble City Madman