Sportswriter takes in Kentucky love of food, hoops

I drove to western Kentucky and back recently, and I’m ready to report a couple of things.

The temperatures were in the upper 60s. The sun was shining, and people were wearing jackets and politely complaining about it being chilly while my family and I stood smiling in short sleeves.

I do mean politely complaining because people are polite there. Perhaps it’s because of my days in Boston, dealing with traffic and disgruntled convenience store clerks, but I notice politeness.

Here’s an example. I stopped for gas at a convenience store. My oldest daughter and her friend were following us in another car. Instead of pulling into the parking lot, they stopped on the side of the road in front of the store.

When I went into the store to pay for the gas the woman at the counter said, “I wonder if they’re having car problems. Do you think they need any help?”

Imagine that conversation in Boston. “What the $%#!& is their problem?”

Yeah, politeness is a big thing with me. That’s why I couldn’t turn down any of the food that was offered to me while I was there. I had chicken-fried steak with cream gravy, biscuits and sausage gravy, fried chicken, pot roast, Krispy Kreme doughnuts, potato salad, beans and steak. I even had some banana pudding and chocolate cream pie. I had to. It was offered to me, and I was just being polite.

In addition to eating, we also played basketball while there. My shooting statistic was 0 for Kentucky. But I can happily report that if my 9-year-old daughter is within a couple or three feet of the basket, you better get a hand in her face. Her two-handed set shot is deadly from that range.

Everyone in Kentucky plays basketball. People who you think couldn’t possibly play can stroke it.

But the competition doesn’t end on the court. My brother and his stepson get along great, but there is a bit of competitiveness.

My brother recently bought a 61-inch TV. It is as big as a wall and, with the lights out, movie watching is just like being at Hoyts cinema.

As my brother showed us some of the features of the set, his stepson Alan interjected, “Mine is 64 inches.”

My brother laughed. I laughed. “Well, it is,” Alan said sheepishly.

Alan is young, married and has a baby on the way. He works for the railroad and life is good.

He is big and rugged and can stick the jump shot. Going inside with the ball against him is too much like work to make the effort.

We also saw aunts, uncles, and cousins who I haven’t seen in years.

I was told umpteen times how much I look like my dad.

My daughters were fussed with.

My mother smiled, happy with the attention she received from her granddaughters.

We laughed with them as they told stories of what we were like when we were too small to remember. Of how I attacked an aunt when she punished my favorite cousin.

It went that way the entire time we were there. We played a lot of “Do You Remember?”

I had spent years thinking that I come from a dysfunctional family. That they live within short distances of each other but have little to do with each other.

I was wrong. I learned that I was the dysfunctional one in the family.

And we learned something else. Thomas Wolfe was wrong; you can go home again. And it’s a good thing to do.

Don Perryman can be reached at 990-8045, 1-800-310-8600 or dperryman@bangordailynews.net.