Over the holidays I spent time with family at my maternal grandparent’s house in Booneville, Mississippi. Yes, “Booneville.” The name’s appropriate for sure, and undoubtedly the landscape of myopia, racism (phrases like “across the tracks” are still spoken during dinner conversation) poverty, and absence of any pretentiousness that the mind conjures up matches exactly what you’d imagine. I was always under the impression that this was the type of place one should always try to escape from. I never took time to think that maybe, just maybe, the place would ever refuse to escape you.
Escape might be too strong a word. It suggests a flee, an avoidance, which, looking back, is probably exactly what I was doing at the time though that type of avoidance has left me in the past few years. Though I’d like to think I would never escape anything from my past now, I still know I wouldn’t come back to this place permanently. Of course, I didn’t grow up in Booneville and I never lived there. Instead, Booneville is a town of selective memory for me that rests its aged foundations about thirty miles north of my hometown. This was the place of all those memories you’d expect from time with grandparents–food, weekend sleepovers, family functions—nothing special save for those who have it in their “here’s what childhood was” lockbox that lumps itself somewhere in the center of your brain.
But Booneville was the type of place, or rather the archetype of place, I needed to get away from, if not for all the reasons above, then for a few extra that I won’t detail now. But, like I said, I don’t know if I’ve ever really gotten away, or at least it’s never really gotten away from me.
Before leaving for New York I went to college at the University of Mississippi (known to most as Ole Miss) in Oxford. For most, Oxford as a town probably wouldn’t be categorized in the same context at Booneville, but for me it always was: Booneville, Oxford, Tupelo, West Point, Amory, Jackson, all the places of my youth seemed the same to me… at least at the time. Looking back, I don’t think I could ever romanticize Booneville, but Oxford had its charms.
Oxford’s charms are those types of charms that you can’t see unless you have the ability to “look past.” If you’re able to look past the pastel colored Polos and pleated khaki shorts you might just see William Faulkner’s charming, and rather beautiful house just off of Old Taylor Road. If you’re able to look past the BMW’s and college football obsessions you might just see a lack of commercialization. Unlike Tupelo, Oxford is impressive for its satisfying amount of local restaurants, cafes, and shops. And if you are willing to see beyond the record DUI citations on a Friday night, you may just see a small coffee shop in downtown Oxford once called “Uptown Coffee.”
Tapping espresso shots and slinging lattes as a barista at Uptown was my first college job, and still my favorite thanks to incredible people I worked with, and the ease of the atmosphere. I left Uptown, and Oxford, in January of 2007 to come to New York. Since then I’ve always held it in my mind that the two—Mississippi and New York—were separated not only by distance, but by chapters in my life: the former was my past, the latter my present. I guess it’s one of those things everyone learns soon enough… sometimes the past just won’t stay put.
Just before leaving Uptown, the owner was preparing to franchise his store based on local success. Our roastery, High Point coffee, and Uptown, thus set out to do just that. The two converged and Uptown’s name was changed to High Point, and the subsequent franchises spread “High Point Coffee” around the U.S.
A few weeks ago my roommate and I were walking in our neighborhood when we saw a sign: “Coming Soon, High Point Coffee.” After confirming with a friend back home I learned that this was indeed a product of franchising rather than coincidence. It’s a bastardization of the Uptown Coffee I once knew; it’s too big for its own good and it more closely resembles a McDonald’s than an arthouse coffee shop, but the one-pound coffee bags say Oxford, Mississippi and the pastries in the display case are all too familiar. It has since opened for business, and I pass by it everyday while running my errands. There it stands, just five blocks from my apartment, closer even then the grocery store where I buy my cage free eggs and organic blueberries, like a testament to some universal truth: home follows you wherever you go.
