A Yankee Walks Into a Southern Restaurant

A New York native looks back on moving South, discovering sweet tea, and beginning an education in Southern life

#Opinion | 1215 p.m. Sept. 27, 2026

Editor’s note: Duane Cross hired Mark Spoor in May 1999 at The Jackson Sun. In the 27 years since, Mark has learned a thing or two about the South, newspapers, NASCAR, and sweet tea. Duane has learned a thing or two about Mark. Somehow, they’re both still learning. The Moore County Observer welcomes a wide range of viewpoints. Opinion pieces and guest submissions reflect the views of their authors and do not necessarily represent those of the Observer, its staff, or its ownership.

This guest submission is from Mark Spoor.

I’m a Southerner – kind of.

I live in Georgia and have for close to 26 years. Before that, I lived in Jackson, Tenn., for almost two. If I’m being honest, the man who runs this digital outlet had a lot to do with both of those stops (more on that later).

Here’s the rub: I grew up in upstate New York.

Now, this isn’t Fuggedaboutit, New York. This is just south of the Catskills, where there are farms, fields, horse racing tracks, and rednecks. (I know, but trust me.) We still love our bagels and our pizza, and it’s still Yankees, Mets, Giants, Jets, and Rangers, but the pace is a little slower, the accent is more Midwestern than Manhattan, and I dare say we’re a bit more polite than our big-city neighbors, despite the fact that we get roughly 976 inches of snow per year.

Still, I did not grow up a Southerner. Far from it. In fact, one of the last newspaper columns I wrote before The Boss plucked me from obscurity to work in West Tennessee (?!) was entitled “Someone Explain NASCAR to Me, Please?”

Wait until you read how that turned out.

Since that day in May 1999, I’ve received a slow education in the ways of the South. I’ve been given this education by everyone from sweet old ladies at the grocery store who love the word “darlin’” to football coaches frustrated in the blazing heat of late summer in West Tennessee to a NASCAR driver who heated up frozen lasagna for me in their hauler at the racetrack.

Allow me to apologize to the 867 Italian moms I knew growing up for eating frozen lasagna. Also, allow me to apologize again for the fact that I kind of liked it.

Anyhow, it’s been quite a journey – and it started with a glass of iced tea.

You’ll notice I didn’t say “sweet tea.” That’s because until the day I was interviewed for a job in the sports department at The Jackson Sun, I had never heard the phrase “sweet tea.” It was “iced tea,” and it always came to you without sugar in it. If you wanted sugar, you added it yourself.

I know, right?

Anyhow, The Boss and the paper’s most tenured sportswriter, a man named Dan Morris, took a fresh-faced, 20-something me to a restaurant in Jackson for lunch.

As I sat down at the table, I had spent all of about 16 hours in the South, so I looked about as out of place and nervous as you could get.

Dan had the type of voice that makes you think he is continually sitting on his front porch with a glass of lemonade, greeting every person who ever walks by. It put me at ease immediately. As for The Boss, he was as old-school South as you can get. I could tell he was passionate about everything, but again, it put me at ease. I had never heard this easy-breezy tone before, and honestly, I really liked it.

When the waitress, Darlene (don’t ask how I have kept that name in my memory for 27 years), came over to ask what everyone wanted to drink, she came to me first. When I said, “Iced tea, please,” an audible noise came from my interviewers, but I thought it was just because of how unusual my lack of Southern drawl must have sounded.

While we waited for the food (I ordered chicken tenders because I am, as always, a grown child), the three of us discussed newspapers, which writers I liked, who my favorite teams were, and whether I could envision myself living in West Tennessee. I wasn’t sure about that last one, but I was leaning more toward it by the minute.

The drinks came. I took a sip, expecting the smooth but bitter taste of the iced tea I grew up drinking. As I looked at Dan and The Boss, they were transfixed on me. I took a big, hearty gulp, thought someone had switched my tea with Mrs. Butterworth’s, but smiled and lied through my teeth when I said, “That’s really good.”

Dan and The Boss let out a hearty chuckle, and after a great afternoon meeting the staff in Jackson, my wife and I moved South.

And more than a generation later, the education continues.