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This is a very old tread, and I thought it could do with a bit of updating:
Madison Central's Debate Team, a couple of years back, ranked number one in North America (I think I'm relaying this accurately. Google it, if the particulars are important to you.). When someone told me about this, the team was headed to Europe, for the grand, WORLD competition. They were the rock stars of the debate world. That should give you an idea of who lives in Madison. It's Alphaville.
Madison is extremely open-minded, but grounded heavily in history. Many, if not most, of its inhabitants are descendants of important families....OR....hyperintelligent, ultra-aggressive, rich white trash. It's actually a good mix. You have FFV (First Families of Virginia), including members of a large Black aristocracy. Then, you have members of Princely Indian families and high-ranking Mafiosi (Sicilian & Russian), who settled here because of the very accepting environment. Then, there are the children and grandchildren of gun-runners and bootleggers, along with those currently preeminent in illicit activities of one sort or another. Madison is like a lifeboat, and everybody is rowing together, and getting along just fine. It works: probably because everybody is focused on acquisition and attainment. You see ninety-year-olds, still shopping for antiques. I get the impression that many of our imports never really had friends, until they came here. It's a very comfortable place to live, for cognitive/economic front-runners, who elsewhere would be social also-rans. Don't let the scary backgrounds of some of our wealthy frighten you. The deep Christian faith of our Mayor, sooner or later, insinuates itself into the souls of most people here, persuading us to abandon our dark ways and walk in the light.
Nice thing about Mississippi is that you are judged, here, onwhat you have, rather than who you are. If you can pay the dues, you're in. You see Debs, Sorority suzies, and women in elite organizations with names not far from 'Goonie Mae Hick'...totally bonded with women with names like Constance Worthington Abravanel. And, of course, the little cabals our menfolk cook up have resulted in some amazing business constructs, which have produced vast (and sometimes world-infamous) fortunes. There are plenty of people who manage real-estate empires from here; and a surprising number of people are headquartered in this very easy place for living everyday life, who consider themselves as living their 'real lives' in Manhattan, Los Angeles, Palm Beach, and Buenos Aires. But real lives are exhausting, expensive, and competitive: so most time is spent here in pleasant, easy, Madison.
The people you see getting off the private planes at Madison's tiny airport will amaze (and sometimes frighten) you. People here pay and threaten their way off America's 'richest' lists. No one would dare compile a comprehensive list of those who inhabit all those mansions and villas tucked into Madison's woodlands and pastures. But such a list would amaze.
You know how the social scene is for those prominent upper-midwesterners, who boat back and forth between isolated island summer 'camps' on the Great Lakes? That's kind of how it is, every day, in Madison. Only, the canoe of choice is a white Lexus SUV, and everybody is doing business, every day. Men wear shorts to business meetings. Flip flops are accepted footwear. Women I know sandwich trips to the personal trainer (unless the trainer is coming to work them out in their home or office gym) between board meetings.
The treasures are hidden within those sprawling 'Acadian' villas everyone is building...or locked away in the vaults of those ornate new banks. One man collects Rolls Royces. Many secretly own hyperluxury autos, and have them trucked to The Kentucky Derby, Pebble Beach, or Palm Beach, for driving. The jewels come out for charity events...along with the Haute Couture/Bespoke clothes. One man I know has a $16,000.00 silk tuxedo from Bijan. A jeweler I've seen at Pilates for years tells me that Madison County people buy jewels just one class down from famous/Hope Diamond type jewels. And not just occasionally. You'd never know it, because you seldom even see watches worn, these days. the day-to-day look is cool and functional.
So, please don't wear your little diamond-chip jewelry in Madison. It will mark you as an outsider. Just wear big, fun 'art' pieces (papier mache is fine), or no jewelry AT ALL, and you'll be fine. Shorts and a T/Polo-shirt are normal attire for both genders. But expensively-maintained teeth are a must (people will get eighteen inches from your face, to check out your teeth, to decide whether you have enough money to hang with them), and new, mid-priced (under 120k) Lexus/BMW/Mercedes vehicles are must-haves. While cool, washable knit shirts and cargo shorts are the uniform, here, don't think you can throw them over an unshapely body. Fitness is seen as an index of your self-discipline and income. DAILY meetings with personal trainers are not unusual. And unless you are incapacitated, it is assumed that you work out at least once per day. If you really want to keep up, you will get in all your TV time, while doing your hour of cardio, mornings....then, you'll do your hour of lifting in the evenings.
Our preacher used to lament that he could not "...keep that revival spirit going all-year long..." . Well, that revival spirit is sustained, in Madison, every waking minute. Everyone is intent upon having, doing and being it all.
Nobody goes to bars. People do not cuss. Smoking or drugs will get you blacklisted. You have to edit what you say, so as to always appear 'nice' and not 'high-falutin'. And Heaven forbid you should admit to having ever done the three-letter-'s'-word thing. Babies in Madison apparently came, special delivery, from Saks Fifth Avenue or Neiman Marcus. Think wholesome, wholesome, WHOLESOME! People here hug at board meetings, and are very genuinely caring of each other. Great emphasis is placed on charities and volunteerism. If you cannot get into that groove, then Madison is not for you.
And be prepared for everyone to find out where you live, and how you decorate. Houses, here, are mostly for showing to people. So, be prepared to be a live-in docent, giving tours of your home to all prospective friends...and neighbors...without advance warning. Hey! It beats rotting in some 'Gold Coast' condo, somewhere, where nobody cares if you live or die. The Jackson area is a major consumer of all luxury home products, and Madison is leading the way. If you can furnish your Acadian-style compound with Swedish antiques, you will instantly be regarded as comme il faut. And yes, you'd better get a good decorator, an no, you dare not try doing it, yourself.
If Madison's rampant wholesomeness is a bit much for you, then move to Jackson. It's where you'll find the smokers, drinkers, druggies, self-styled 'intellectuals', economic liberals, and party people. If you want even more wholesomeness (but less achievement mania) than what you'll find in Madison, move to Rankin County, which is almost exclusively Fundamentalist Christian. It's still a mostly 'dry' county, and the lack of booze discourages degenerates from moving there from Jackson.
Our current big news is that Tulane University will be opening a small campus here, catty-cornered from that fabulous Italian palace of a CVS Pharmacy that is going up. Everyone is beyond excited, and committed to doing whatever it takes to get the school to eventualy put in a full-sized campus. Beagle Bagel is open, packed, and delectable, in the fancy French manor house type building next to St. Joseph School. Big houses are still being built, and prices have not plummeted. The St. Peter Orthodox congregation has moved into the old church on Church Street, and is SPLENDID: great landscaping, and a dazzling gold dome. Needless to say, the teardown/renovation craze in that neighborhood is ON. Young couples and retirees are snapping up sixties ranch houses for around 150. You cannot overinvest in Madison, and investing they are. And now, they're only a few blocks from Tulane! TULANE!
And yes, I have hand-picked little bits from here and there, to paint a picture much more intense than what is immediately apparent. Some people just see a forest. Some people see Cypresses, Magnolias, and Possums.
It's not charming, it's a freaking maze. It's the opposite of charming - even though baroque can be just that. It's all the worse things about baroque. You can be 500 feet from where you're going - in a huge parking lot - and end up having to pass through 3 or 4 curbed intersections (navigating traffic the whole way) just to get there. I once made the mistake of stopping at that fast food gas station and thought I would never get out of the place.
Where else in America can you find a faux Greek Revival Exxon and Baroque Italian CVS Pharmacy? Who else has a Federalist red brick overpass and Rococo Wal-Mart. Say what you will...It's charming. Alas, admittedly, I love it.
There is a reason you can't find it anywhere else in America...
I'm sure you've heard the well known phrase, "You can put lipstick on a pig, but it's still a pig."
Where else in America can you find a faux Greek Revival Exxon and Baroque Italian CVS Pharmacy? Who else has a Federalist red brick overpass and Rococo Wal-Mart. Say what you will...It's charming. Alas, admittedly, I love it.
Franklin, TN or Germantown has structures zoned to look like this too. I think some suburbs of Charlotte, NC do to. Madison is still no Franklin or Germantown.
Mock if you must. But the French Chateau Kroger at Highland Colony is to die for. And that designer Wendy's! Seriously though, yes, it is charming because of the sheer chutzpah to apply classical architectural features to gas stations, strip malls, and big box stores. I for one admire the effort and am thankful for every last shrub, flower, tree, and fountain put in to try and make things nice.
Well, they will make for some very cool looking ruins in a couple of decades when the money has moved on and the "city" is struggling to find tenants for the empty buildings..
From an out of state perspective Madison is nothing more than a status ***** of a suburb. Everything screams "Look at me! Look at me! I want people to think I'm worth something. The brick facades are horrible. I don't know what exactly is indicitave to central MS, but It's MISSISSIPPI not GREECE.
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Originally Posted by GrandviewGloria
Madison is extremely open-minded, but grounded heavily in history.
^ Instant LIE
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Nice thing about Mississippi is that you are judged, here, onwhat you have, rather than who you are. If you can pay the dues, you're in.
So true and so sad. The same people who think like that also wonder why Mississippi is taken for a joke everywhere else.
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The treasures are hidden within those sprawling 'Acadian' villas everyone is building...
Acadian villas that you would NEVER see in Acadiana. Suburban Baton Rouge yea, but not Acadiana.
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Nobody goes to bars. People do not cuss. Smoking or drugs will get you blacklisted. You have to edit what you say, so as to always appear 'nice' and not 'high-falutin'. And Heaven forbid you should admit to having ever done the three-letter-'s'-word thing.
Yeah, because they go to Jackson to do their dirt. That way the city takes the bad rep and the culprits jet off to Sprawlville where everything is said to be squeaky clean.
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And be prepared for everyone to find out where you live, and how you decorate. Houses, here, are mostly for showing to people.
A damn shame
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If you can furnish your Acadian-style compound with Swedish antiques, you will instantly be regarded as comme il faut. And yes, you'd better get a good decorator, an no, you dare not try doing it, yourself.
Acadian-style = Poorly design, shotty constructed, neo-french chateau styled mcmansion purported to be of Louisiana style .
They have a rediculous amount of them in Hattiesburg as well.
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Our current big news is that Tulane University will be opening a small campus here, catty-cornered from that fabulous Italian palace of a CVS Pharmacy that is going up. Everyone is beyond excited, and committed to doing whatever it takes to get the school to eventualy put in a full-sized campus. Beagle Bagel is open, packed, and delectable, in the fancy French manor house type building next to St. Joseph School. Big houses are still being built, and prices have not plummeted. The St. Peter Orthodox congregation has moved into the old church on Church Street, and is SPLENDID: great landscaping, and a dazzling gold dome. Needless to say, the teardown/renovation craze in that neighborhood is ON. Young couples and retirees are snapping up sixties ranch houses for around 150. You cannot overinvest in Madison, and investing they are. And now, they're only a few blocks from Tulane! TULANE!
It will be Tulane in name only. You would never be able to get the full Green Wave experience in a suburb.
Last edited by WestbankNOLA; 09-10-2009 at 10:09 PM..
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