Socks

We decided to buy socks from each state that we bike through; after spending a month in CA and NOT thinkin' of it!
So we have AZ, NM, and TX socks.
We looked for LA socks, but to no avail; figure we'll have to order 'em online once we're home in the Flatwest.
Then we biked into MS. Their flag has the Confederate flag embedded in it. Had a long conversation with an old white guy at one of the campgrounds along "the Trace", and while I enjoyed our conversations I also had flashbacks to the preacher in TX who put out a sign in front of his church "Vote for the Mormon capitalist, not the Muslim communist".
I brought up the fact that we had hardly seen any black people/descendants of slaves/African-Americans on our trip through MS so far and how I felt like what we were seeing wasn't a "real" representation of MS. And I asked him, gently, about the Confederate flag in the state flag; did many black people fly it? He was adamant that it was not a symbol of slavery, that it was just "a piece of history". Maybe. Maybe not.
Then he closed, much later, with "we call our little 3 acre place 'the plantation'".
Then we rode through the corner of AL. Looked up their flag, after catching a glimpse of one on a passing motor vehicle: very much like the Confederate flag. Huh.
Today, in TN, we stopped at a gas station for a cold can of Coke, and I saw a black guy. One guy. And when he walked by us, 4 times, he wouldn't look at us. Didn't seem relaxed, didn't say hello. I got the sense he was keepin' his head down, mindin' his own business; didn't want no trouble.
And that clinched it for me: I ain't buyin' MS or AL socks. Sorry.

(And I'm not sayin' "I ain't gonna buy TN socks", even though this last experience was here in TN. It just reminded me of my earlier thoughts and questions. The TN flag does not have the Confederate flag in it.)