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Travel Notes: Georgilina The free magazines set out on most hotel room desks are a perk of modern travel. Savannah’s River Inn featured the current issue of the Savannah Magazine, which was celebrating twenty years of publication. The magazine had invited its readers to submit “20 Big Ideas for Our Future.” Big Idea #3 caught my eye: “Erase the South Carolina/Georgia state line and think in bioregional rather than political terms.” This idea makes sense geographically speaking because the eastern states of the South striate north to south. On the east coast, the coastal plains first appear, then the hill country, and as you travel farther west, the mountains rise. The political lines ignore these geographic distinctions as they run east and west cutting across geographic bands. Regardless of the arbitrary political boundaries, people in the banded geographic areas have more in common, and more common economic opportunities, with one another than with other areas of their own states. The low country is a good example. This coastal region starts just north of Jacksonville, Florida, and extends at least to Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. Two states and a small part of two others include the low country, but the low country is distinctly different from the rest of their respective states. People simply do things a little differently in the low country. Take dancing, for example. A friend who has spent time in the low country related the following story. Early in his business career, he was a young banker for a large multi-national bank. One night my friend entertained the head of the international unit from London, England. As they made small talk, the Englishman inquired how the young man had met his wife. The low-country boy divulged that they’d met while shagging. The boy continued the story by saying that he was a pretty good shagger. One night this girl he’d known casually asked him to shag. He noticed that the Englishman swallowed and almost choked as he heard the story, but the young man continued, saying, “Oh yeah, she’s good at shagging. I think that first night we shagged four hours.” 385 The young man couldn’t figure out why he was getting such a strange response from this Englishman for recounting an innocent story. The older gentleman said something to the effect that he was glad they had something in common that they could do together. My friend replied that yes, it was great, but that they hadn’t had much time to shag recently. He then offered to call his wife and they all could go shagging together that night. The Englishman asked my friend exactly what shagging meant in America. My friend explained that the shag was a local swing dance which had originated on the beaches near Myrtle Beach. They shared a good laugh when the older man told him what shagging means to an Englishman. Shagging is a low-country phenomenon. It was honored by the South Carolina legislature in 1984 as the state dance of South Carolina. Outside of the low country, shagging is little known, even though it has been exported to other parts of the country by low-country refugees. Shag descended from the jitterbug, the Charleston, and a little known dance called the Big Apple. The Big Apple was an African-American group dance. Later the frantic pace of those dances slowed and took the tempo of rhythm and blues. Though it’s considered a beach dance, this Carolina swing dance has elements of both east coast and west coast swing. Sometimes, it’s called “beach swing.” Shag requires a great deal of footwork. It’s often said the shag is danced from the waist down—and that shaggers can hold their beer or cigarettes while dancing. Shag music is pretty familiar. It’s rhythm and blues—soul with a few disco songs mixed in. Songs like “Under the Boardwalk,” and most songs by Barry White, are staple items on the shag playlist. There were a few strange songs, such as William Bell’s “Easy Coming Out, Hard Going In.” One song, “Wake up Mommy; Daddy’s Drinking Whiskey Again,” seemed out of place with these mostly over-fifty white people who were turning, spinning, and pivoting to the music. Shag music historically has a bi-racial origin. Both whites and blacks shagged in the low country, though during the days of segregation not at the same places. Since I had...

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