Assignment 3 - Averi Ricks - Traveling for Club Volleyball

I play club volleyball during the off season and we travel to surrounding states like Ohio, Indiana, Tennessee, and Florida. This is pretty much the only traveling my family does, so my experiences are kinda limited. I can't say that this impacts my views on the world much, but it definitely does impact my views on our country. I think it's interesting how Ohio and Indiana are one state away, yet they're considered to be part of the Western half of the country, and this shows when you order traditional southern food at restaurants and sweet tea. That contrast is crazy to me! It's also interesting to see how much southern values intensify as you go more south, like to TN or FL. For example, the food is always better there, and I always see more confederate flags (I'm not saying this is a southern value just that it's a problem mostly in the south). Here in Lexington, it's rare to see a confederate flag, but in Gatlinburg every tourist shop has clothes with the confederate flag proudly displayed in their window for all to see. People are also way more open about it. All these changes are so crazy to me because TN is only a state away yet something that's so minuscule here is a lot more prominent there. From all of this I've learned that every state is very unique from the ones that border it. These experiences enrich my educational environment because I'm learning about the people of that place. For example, I learned that some people really are proud of their "roots" and want to display it. I honestly didn't think that mindset still existed before I went to TN, but it's very clear that it still does. It's good to visit other parts of the country because you're constantly learning things about that specific state and you start to understand that states in the same region aren't exactly alike.