Family trees that don't split.

This will reveal me as a giant hypocrite, but Friday's OPRAH pick made me curious about Faulkner. I deride him, though I've never read him.

So I picked up AS I LAY DYING, doing the one thing that my "Things to Do" list said not to do, and I've read 120 pages of it.

It's fun to read it out loud, using the accents I learned growing up in Buford around my stepfather and his backwater kin.

I thought it would be difficult to understand. Instead, with a little work, it reminds me of when I used to translate my stepfather's racist, redneck, ignorant ramblings into English.

Jenipher was telling me today, in light of my comparison between Faulkner's characters and my stepfather and stepbrother, that she used to be afraid to call my house.

"BINGY - BIIII-I-NGY!!!!!!!," I remember them calling to me. "TELL-UHHH-PHO-OOONE!"