A friend and I were discussing

movies, books, tv shows, etc. and I mentioned that I seem to have an increasing interest and appreciation for things drawn from or taking place in the south, or perhaps it's The South.

As a Virginia girl, my geographic region has always been important to me, but as I age I seem to be more engaged by the stories, the people, the events that characterize my heritage. Of course, we southerners are still unique individuals, but our historical and geographical heritage is a background (literally and figuratively) that colors or shapes our experiences.

I suppose we've experienced the degradation and misunderstanding that ethnic groups around the globe have, being typecast as all of a sort, simply portrayed as easily defined caricatures of actual people. It's all overstated and misrepresents and misconstrues any subtle differences between regions within the south, and certainly doesn't correctly depict any real person.

Also, there are things about my region and our history that I am not happy about or proud of. Thankfully for me, I was not raised to be a bigot, not taught to dislike any group of people. But, truthfully, some of the biases of my elders and peers affected my views on events in my life and in the world. That's human nature.

There are things we've done well, however. "Southern hospitality" is not just a literary invention, or a phrase casually explaining the tendency to strive to make guests comfortable, to make them feel at home. I've experienced it in many southern locations, from many different people. Of course, I've also experienced gracious hospitality in other regions.

As a naive southern girl, without experience outside my home environ, I was surprised and pleased to learn first-hand that people in "the north" were kind and generous and could be good neighbors. That was pretty important educating for me.

But aside from generalized experiences, we can point to specific acts by southerners that were good or bad. Maybe on another day, I'll consider things we've done that were not justifiable, or defensible because they were narrow-minded, self-serving petty acts that have shamed us. There are plenty of those in our corporate past.

But there is an event I think of with thankfulness and gladness, recalled and observed today. The 19th amendment to our constitution became law because a Tennessee lawmaker voted 'yes' on August 18, 1920. I personally appreciate his mother urging his support, pointing out ratification was the right thing to do.

Yep, this day in history, the south stood up and did the right thing. Tennessee led us forward in the right direction.