“On a recent trip, this lady called me ‘rustic, yet refined.’ I’ve never felt so understood,” says my friend Lacee Watkins from Alabama.
Rustic, yet refined is a personality type I see in Southerners often. Both men and women.
If we believe what goes down on Netflix’s The Crown is even half true, I see the same trait in the royal family. In Season 4 of The Crown, there’s a clear winner and loser that stand out to me. For instance, Princess Diana is a triumph with the entire royal family when she visits Balmoral. She dresses up for dinner, yes. However, she also dons hunting gear to go out with Prince Philip and help him snag a stag.
In the show, Diana says that she’s a “country girl at heart” and proceeds to crouch down on the grass. In contrast, Margaret Thatcher is portrayed as prepping for a day in the Aberdeenshire countryside with Queen Elizabeth in a blue suit with full hair and makeup. Thatcher seems to hate every second of it and to be a literal stick in the mud. At one point, her shoes get mired down in the muck and you can tell she’s miserable.
It all reminds me of Vicky in The Parent Trap. You know, Mitch’s terrible fiancé. The one that couldn’t hang in the woods. She was better suited for white linen table cloths and poolside martinis. But Two-Sided Southern means you’re able to be elegant and sociable like Vicky, kick ass in a boardroom of men like Margaret Thatcher, and be as down to earth and up for anything like Princess Diana. TSS means you can hold your own in any situation and enjoy yourself. That’s entirely like my friend Lacee. She is the life of the party at stuffy client events, as well as at camp outs. With her thick southern drawl and disarming smile, Lacee is truly rustic, yet refined.
Now, I’m not saying it’s unusual for a Southerner to arrive to an outdoorsy pursuit in full make up and jewelry or wearing expensive loafers. In fact, I’ve seen it more often than not. But, the fact that they are often game for hanging outdoors and come to it with a sense of adventure, while looking good to boot, is a Two-Sided Southern trait in my book.
The Royal family is one of the most refined and regal group of people in the world. Moreover, Queen Elizabeth and her heirs have customs, tastes and luxuries that go beyond even the wealthiest in our society. If they challenge people to reveal their true selves by putting them to the famous “Balmoral Test”—a weekend out in the rustic Scotland countryside… Well, then they are good, solid folks in my book.
As a result, it’s lovely to see that the House of Windsor has some Two-Sided Southern in them.
