It's all a matter of perspective. People who live in this area who are originally from more southerly portions of the country continue to tell me this isn't the Real South. At the same people from the more northerly and westerly parts feel that we are in the South.
I will concede that this area is probably a lot less southern in its feel than it once was. Washington, DC has become an international city, something it really wasn't, even as recently as the Kennedy administration, and perhaps not even that long ago. And as with other major urban centers, that influence seeps out into its suburbs. Even so, there is a very different feel here than there is in the shadow of New York City. Politics vs. Finance? Peninsula vs. Island? North vs. South vs. Mid-Atlantic? Or some combination of all of the above.
So perhaps all of us who come to this area for whatever reason are strangers in a strange land,northerner and southerner alike.
Although, if this isn't the south, why are large stretches of Route 1 through this area called the Jefferson Davis Highway?
For that matter, in Connecticut, why do we often refer to Route (I say 'root') 1 as the Boston Post Road. I guess because that where it's on its way to. But 'Jefferson Davis Highway?'
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