I had worked as a journalist and news manager in television newsrooms in several cities around the country, including seven years in Miami — which is the equivalent of dog years, so my time working there felt like a half a century.
After a particularly bad month in 2007 with too much body-count news, too much time spent sitting in bumper-to-bumper traffic on US 1, and too little joy, I decided to make a quality of life move. I nearly took a job at a great TV station in Raleigh, North Carolina, but just before I signed on the dotted line, a similar news management job was posted in Greenville, South Carolina.
I was resistant to the idea of even considering something else. I had been to Raleigh, loved the folks there, and had even picked the neighborhood where I would live. But just weeks before, my significant other had traveled through Greenville, and he was pretty insistent that I check out the town.
“Come on, Go look at Greenville,” my life partner, Eric, said. “It’s near the mountains and there’s a waterfall in a park right in the middle of the downtown. You have nothing to lose.”
I decided to humor him and go check out Greenville before I packed up and headed to Raleigh three weeks later. So, I flew into this town I had never heard of and was greeted by a couple lovely men who were the bosses at the station.
Driving in on Interstate 385, I semi-listened to them while making mental lists of a thousand things I needed to get done before the move to Raleigh.
And then we turned the corner onto Main Street in Greenville. Oh my gosh! Could a city be any cuter? Why had I never heard of Greenville?
But anyway, there’s the job in Raleigh. A chance for a start-over in a quieter, slower-paced place than Miami. The contract was all negotiated and I just needed to sign.
But wait just a minute. These tree-lined streets. The turn-of-the-century architecture mixed with new buildings. The hustle and bustle of ridiculously happy looking people on the street. What is this Greenville place about? Never mind. I am moving to Raleigh in three weeks. Just three weeks
After checking out the small but pleasant television station in Greenville, I went to dinner with several of the newsroom managers, all of them charming and friendly. And the ambience at Soby’s, the downtown restaurant with its old brick interior and cozy booths, was surprisingly hip. This is South Carolina, right? I was admittedly looking out from under a very large pile of preconceived notions.
I truly had nothing to lose, so at dinner, while enjoying the delicious New South cuisine, small-talk and pleasantries, I finally blurted out my number one question about this deep-in-the-South city: “So, just how racist is it around here?”
The looks on faces during the next moment of silent hesitation could be described as nothing other than surprise tinged with confusion. The assistant news director, a lifelong resident of the area, answered thoughtfully, “If you go outside the city into the some of the rural communities, you might find some vestiges of the way people used to look at things, but really, I think you would find we are an integrated station in an integrated city that has very little of the old Southern way of thinking.”
Throughout that evening, at each turn, it was as though Greenville charmed me, romanced me, and then just plain swept me off my feet.
I sat on a bench in front of the gorgeously restored 1920s Poinsett Hotel as a horse-drawn carriage carried a snuggling couple past me under the trees covered with white twinky lights. I didn’t know then if it was love or infatuation, but my sudden change of heart shocked me, my family and Eric.
I called him, and then my mother, laugh-crying, saying, “This place is like Disney World! I am calling Raleigh tomorrow to tell them I am sorry. I am moving to Greenville!”