Two hundred years after my ancestor explored the hills, rivers and valleys of East Tennessee, including a spot where Big Creek meets the Holston River not far from where my wife grew up, and on Long Island in Kingsport not far from where I grew up, I worked at my first job, a cashier/short order cook for McLendy’s, a fast food restaurant in downtown Kingsport in a building now home to a CPA and travel agency…
My childhood was rather sheltered culturally.
The vast majority of people I knew and met on a daily basis were WASPs. One exception — my first and second grade school years where my best friend, Kevin, was African-American and fell in love with my sister.
From 3rd grade (age 8) until 10th grade (age 16), I only knew a few Jewish friends and two Hispanic friends who were not WASPs.
In 10th grade, I turned 16 and, with my father’s help, purchased my first car, a gold Dodge Dart. To help pay for the car, I started working at a “real” job because my lawn mowing business didn’t bring in enough income for car expenses — monthly car payment, gas/oil and insurance (the last of which my father paid).
I question whether a fast food entry-level position is real work but for a suburbanite living in the Tennessee foothills it counted because I had official training, wore a uniform and had to punch a time clock to record my work hours.
McLendy’s exposed me to the “big city” life, or so I thought, basically because I was surrounded with people who were not my high school mates.
One workmate was an older guy (probably 30 years old) who had spent 10 years in the U.S. Army as a bazooka specialist who could not find a civilian job that took advantage of his unique skills handling a shoulder-fired weapon. He constantly complained about the lack of civilian support for a person like him which the U.S. Government had invested thousands of dollars training for war. He advised me to be careful if I decided on a military career and get an assignment (MOS) which had useful civilian skills like office clerk or driver.
Another workmate was about my age — Greg Watterson.
Have I told you about him? He was the first African-American person I got to know as an adult.
Yeah, my life was pretty sheltered culturally.
Greg was surprised I held no bias against him and I didn’t know why.
I didn’t know about ethnic cliques or subcultural biases except remotely through the evening news.
Greg was shocked I knew nothing about him because he knew a little bit about me.
By the time I started at McLendy’s I had shown an interest in acting, having participated in my high school’s performance of the musical “Bye Bye Birdie.”
Other of my fellow actors/high school mates had made friends with actors in our rival high school in Kingsport, Dobyns-Bennett.
One such actor was Justin Faire whose nickname was Justin Fairy.
At age 16 I understood there were boys/men who showed effeminate traits but I didn’t understand that effeminate boys/men are usually homosexuals.
Justin was (and from I’ve seen on Facebook still is) very effeminate.
So was Greg.
Greg was shocked that not only did I show no animosity toward him as an African-American but also no animosity toward him as an effeminate man.
At first he thought it was probably because I knew his father was important, a local business owner on the city council.
Surely, Greg asked, I had seen his father’s business, a famous liquor store in town?
Nope, my parents weren’t big drinkers.
Sure, Greg asked, I had heard about his father’s comments in city council meetings?
Nope, my father was opposed to us watching TV news and because I didn’t live in the city of Kingsport I didn’t pay attention to Kingsport-related news articles in the Kingsport newspaper.
So, Greg concluded, I didn’t show respect for Greg because of his father.
Nope, Greg had my respect for him because he was a person, not because of someone or something else.
Greg told me he was close friends with several of my classmate, including Justin Faire and Jeff Fleischer, if I knew what Greg meant.
Greg laughed when it was obvious I didn’t get what he was talking about.
At that point in my life, I had not yet kissed a girl, I mean really kiss a girl (not counting the boy/girl party in 5th grade when, at age 10, I had to go in a basement closet with a girl, Renee Wells (who later was pregnant at age 14) to kiss her after a “spin the bottle” game put us two together); or the time I pressed my lips to a friend, Patricia, when we were nine years old to see what kissing was all about.
Therefore, I certainly didn’t know or understand why two guys would want to kiss each other or anything else that has to do with homosexual activity — it just wasn’t a part of my upbringing — something that Greg had shared with his friends Justin and Jeff.
Greg said that he knew about me already even though I didn’t know about him.
I couldn’t see how.
Greg said that I had been a really nice friend to his friends Justin and Jeff and they had mentioned my name to Greg.
Ummm…what?
Greg laughed. He was playing with me in a way that I had seen Justin and Jeff play games with me verbally. I didn’t understand it was how homosexual men flirted.
Greg said that I was as clueless about his verbal wordplay with him as I had been with Justin and Jeff.
Times like those reminded me that my set of thoughts are often fogged and closed in by a type of social disconnection similar to but not the same as Asberger’s syndrome, a type of mild autism, a mental condition I have dealt with my whole life whereby I see myself in conversation with others, completely comprehend what they are saying but another part of me keeps me separate from them as a natural protection against their ability to make fun of my disconnection.
Girls/women in high school also joked that I was clueless about their flirtatious advances toward me when, in fact, I was fully aware of their intentions and kept my distance.
Today, I drove my mother around downtown Kingsport on the way to see some pre-owned/used motorcycles…
As I drove her around, I remembered my youth and my adulthood all the way up to the present day.
I don’t understand what is supposed to be my species.
I don’t understand why I, a set of states of energy in motion here in this particular place and time for no other reason than happenchance interconnectedness, has a recorded history that makes no sense. We live in this vast universe of which Earth’s history, and the history of only one species’ previous progenitors, is of little meaning, is it not?
Why are our ancestors and what they did of any importance to us when we haven’t yet begun to explore the cosmos, living and dying over and over again on this habitable rock?
Whilst rehashing my father’s side of the family in my thoughts and on this blog, I found a history of my mother’s side of the family I’d recorded in another blog entry years ago. Despite rereading the entry, I still don’t understand why it has any significance — aren’t all of just the same despite outer appearances to the contrary?:
From “The history of Blount County, Tennessee and its people, 1795-1995,” pg. 352, article 1023 “Pioneer family from DEFFITAHL to TEFFETELLER” In 1748, a young man named Johannes DEFFITHAL left southern Germany. He traveled to Rotterdam, Holland where he boarded a ship to America. The ship was the “Hampshire” and it docked in Philadelphia, PA. Due to “Americanization”, the immigrant’s name was translated into ”John DEVENDALL”. John later moved to MD and his name was changed again, this time to TIEFENTELLER. He died in 1775. That same year, his son Michael was married.
Subject: Origins of the Diffendall’s/Deffendall’s
Post Date: January 30, 2005 at 12:03:39
Message URL: http://genforum.genealogy.com/diffendall/messages/7.html
Forum: Diffendall Family Genealogy Forum
Forum URL: http://genforum.genealogy.com/diffendall/
I recently ran across a Rotterdam, Netherlands record, unfortunately I was unable to copy it, that mentioned a Johann Tiefenthaler leaving for the U.S. at the same time and same ship and arriving in the same location as Johannes Divendall (other different spellings have been used for this last name.)
I believe these two to be the same person. I then checked for a Tiefenthaler in the southern part of Germany, particularly close to or on the Rhein River. Sure enough, I found one Johann Tieffenthaler, christened 25 Aug. 1718 in Bickensohl, Freiburg, Baden, Germany, father: Christoph Tiefenthaler who married Susanna Rieffler/Riessler on 9 Aug. 1707 in Bickensohl. This Johann has an older sister named Anna Barbara Tieffenthaler, christened 9 Dec. 1711 in Bickensohl. There are more Tieffenthaler’s in this region. Next, I checked for a Barbara Weise in Freiburg, Baden, Germany region. I found Barbara Wiss, christened 19 Feb. 1725 in Katholisch, Elzach, Baden, Germany. Her father is Joseph Wiss and mother is Agatha Maier b. 5 Feb. 1706 in Elzach. This I believe to be a very strong lead to our common ancestor, while I have found nothing on Hans Jorg Dievedal except that he was deported back to the Netherlands from England as a reject for American colonization in 1709 due to belonging to the wrong religion.
If anyone can help with this it would be greatly appreciated, you too Eric.
Karen Deffendall Vogt
Bog, Swamp, River and Garden 