Mississippi Transplant: Mary Jane Meadows
"As long as I make my home here, I will work to make equality, inclusion, and justice an everyday reality. I will help move Mississippi’s dark history out of the closet and into the light of day."
What does it mean to call Mississippi home? Why do people choose to leave or live in this weird, wonderful, and sometimes infuriating place? Mary Jane Meadows says she’s had multiple lives. In her first one, she attended Mobile, Alabama’s segregated public schools, until racial integration in 1969, when she “walked through a picket line of irate parents to enter 11th grade at Theodore High School.” Now Mary Jane is on her third life in Tupelo, MS, where she’s a progressive political organizer and activist who founded and helps lead Indivisible Northeast Mississippi. Today, Mary Jane shares why she felt called to “start a resistance group in Deep Red Mississippi” and how she’s built a deeply rooted community of friends and neighbors.
Where are you from?
I was born and raised in Mobile County, Alabama. A water child, I lived in and on Mobile Bay, Dog River and Alligator Bayou. This bayou, with real alligators and water moccasins, was our swimming hole. As a child when people asked where I lived, I would report, “I live down the road in the woods.”
Born in 1952, I am a product of the Jim Crow system of racial apartheid. I was educated in segregated public schools until racial integration in 1969, when I walked through a picket line of irate parents to enter 11th grade at Theodore High School.
How long have you lived in Mississippi?
I moved to Tupelo, MS, in 1975, at age twenty-two with my then husband to start his dental practice. My first life here lasted for thirty years. In 2005, I took leave of my marriage and our family home. I moved to Oxford and spent three years in exile there as I finished my undergraduate degree at University of Mississippi in 2006 at age fifty-four. I then spent seven wonderful years in Fairhope, Alabama. In 2012, Tupeloan Reed Hillen and I connected while we were both attending a wedding of a mutual friend in Tupelo. Reed and I were married in 2015 and I wound up back in Tupelo and started my second life here.
Born in 1952, I am a product of the Jim Crow system of racial apartheid. I was educated in segregated public schools until racial integration in 1969, when I walked through a picket line of irate parents to enter 11th grade at Theodore High School.
What does “home” mean to you? How does Mississippi fit into that definition?
I think of “home” as both the birthplace of my biological family on Dog River, as well as the home in Tupelo in which I lived with my husband and children for thirty years. Right now, home is again in Tupelo with my husband Reed.
Over my ten years as a single person I learned how to create my True Home within myself. Now, no matter where I am placed, or choose to live, Home is in my back pocket.
Here I made lifelong best soul friends. Here I birthed, and with the community’s help, raised my two children. Here I have become a part of a Chosen Family, a Beloved Community of all shapes, sizes, and colors of humanity. I glory in Mississippi’s verdant rural terrain: kudzu-draped trees and the ubiquitous cotton, corn, and soybean fields that dot our landscape.
How have you cultivated community in Mississippi? Who are the people who have made you feel rooted here?
For me, Church is the first place I go for community. Church is a touchstone, an anchor for moving out into the wider community. Early on, I met most of the significant people in my life in church. I was a United Methodist for many years. Currently, I am a member of the Episcopal Church.
My deepest, long term friendships of forty-five years keep me grounded and connected to reality. Geographically and emotionally, these folks are all five minutes away. Over the last eight years of organizing work with Indivisible, I have formed a new community with people I would never have met in my previous White Lady Bubble.
Instead of living with my new husband on the corner of Easy Street and Happy Lane, fanning myself on the front porch, I was called to start a resistance group in Deep Red Mississippi. I became an organizer and political activist with the Indivisible organization.
What’s the weirdest question or assumption you’ve encountered about Mississippi (or about you as a Mississippian) by someone who’s never been here?
When I travel to distant places in the US, and abroad, and I report that I live in Mississippi, people usually imagine that my mindset and belief system is conservative. People also assume that Mississippi is a cultural desert and wasteland. In both cases nothing could be further from the truth. Mississippi’s brain trust, organic art and literature are a genre unto itself.
How has living in Mississippi affected your identity and your life’s path?
I divide my identities into three distinct periods. My first identity was as a White woman in Mississippi whose life path consisted of marriage, husband, children, homemaking, volunteer and church work. I married before I completed my college degree. In 2003, after a thirty year hiatus, I returned to college at Ole Miss to dabble in some courses. This time, education changed my identity and my life’s path.
At age fifty-two, in English classes I found and developed a self, a voice, and I learned to think on paper. A Race and Ethnicity sociology class exploded my worldview and rearranged my DNA. I learned that Race is a social construction and has no basis in biology. The concept of race was invented! Genetically, my DNA is the same as 99.9% of other humans no matter the skin color. I learned that as a white person, I am gifted with “unearned white privilege.”
Metanoia.
My transformation continued in 2005 after I left my marital home at age fifty-two. I was on my own for the first time in my life. I graduated from The University of Mississippi in 2006 with a B.A. in General Liberal Arts at age fifty-four.
Fast forward to my third life. I married Reed Hillen in 2015 and Donald Trump was elected in 2016. Instead of living with my new husband on the corner of Easy Street and Happy Lane, fanning myself on the front porch, I was called to start a resistance group in Deep Red Mississippi. I became an organizer and political activist with the Indivisible organization.
What is something that you’ve learned about Mississippi only by living here? In what ways has Mississippi lived up to your expectations?
When I first moved here in 1975, I expected that it would be like Alabama. After all, Mississippi was a southern state and right next to Alabama on the map. When I visited the First United Methodist Church in Tupelo, it seemed that everyone I met there was a cousin of some other Mississippian, up and down the state. Everyone was Kin! I was an outsider and I didn’t have access to The Mississippi Code.
When family or friends asked what Mississippi was like, I would tell them that “Mississippi is not just another state, it’s another planet; it’s the land that time forgot.” I later learned that over the last 150 years elected state leaders designed and perpetuated an efficient system of white supremacy, poverty, poor health outcomes and an uneducated citizenry. That Mississippi ranks last in all indicators of quality of life should surprise no one.
When I travel to distant places in the US, and abroad, and I report that I live in Mississippi, people usually imagine that my mindset and belief system is conservative. People also assume that Mississippi is a cultural desert and wasteland. In both cases nothing could be further from the truth.
Do you ever consider moving away someday? Does a sense of duty keep you rooted here? Do you have a “tipping point”?
For the foreseeable future, my tent is pitched here, but I will always be ready to go if and when my circumstances change. I have found that taking an intractable stance about anything in the future is foolhardy. Here I am geographically close to my biological family as well as to my chosen family and friends.
When I travel and I return home, I am always thankful that I live in this rural, lush place of natural beauty. I love our small city of Tupelo where I don’t spend half of my life in traffic. As far as duty goes, I now feel more of a duty to myself rather to a place.
As long as I make my home here, I will work to make equality, inclusion, and justice an everyday reality. I will help move Mississippi’s dark history out of the closet and into the light of day. I will work to create Beloved Community right here, right now. I will work to make that “tipping point” move in a positive direction.
What do you wish the rest of the country understood about Mississippi?
I want to tell our state and the rest of the country that positive, progressive change is happening right this very minute in every county, and every community in Mississippi.
Case in point: Wright Thompson’s new book, The Barn, is a myth buster and shines a bright light into previously hidden places that we’ve long kept secret. In January, our Indivisible group offered a community discussion at our Lee County Library on The Barn. In his book, Thompson speaks about growing up near the barn where Emmett Till was tortured and murdered, but until recently, never knew it existed. Many of the thirty-five persons in attendance were White and had grown up in the Delta. Discussing and wrestling with our common but hidden history in a safe and open space was a powerful experience for all. Many artists, writers and activists are cracking open the long closed vaults of the status quo and challenging the current power structure. Our people have glimpsed and felt change and there is no going back.
Do you have a favorite Mississippi writer, artist, or musician who you think everyone needs to know about?
When I was at Ole Miss in 2005 taking English classes I was graced to have Beth Ann Fennelly as an instructor for several classes. A poet and writer, she gave me the tools and the confidence to believe that my story was worthy to tell. Beth Ann is a Bright Star and a Mississippi Joy.
Charlie Buckley, a gifted young artist and painter living in Oxford, is a treasure. Over the last ten years, I have watched his work progress and mature into a world class talent. I just wish he offered layaway so I could buy another of his paintings!
If you had one billion dollars to invest in Mississippi, how would you spend your money?
Without a healthy, educated population we are doomed to failure–as human beings and as a workforce. Black, White, Muslim, Chinese, Lebanese: our futures and well-being are like the one root system of an Aspen clone: we are inextricably linked together.
I would invest in affordable, accessible health care and in world class public education.
Many artists, writers and activists are cracking open the long closed vaults of the status quo and challenging the current power structure. Our people have glimpsed and felt change and there is no going back.
What or who do you want to shamelessly promote? (It can absolutely be a project you’re working on, or something you are involved in.)
I am excited to be part of Working Together Mississippi, an organization which brings institutions in communities together across racial, religious, and geographic lines. We build power together to take action on issues that benefit the community for the common good.
Of course, I want to promote the Indivisible network and in particular, Indivisible Northeast Mississippi. Indivisible NE MS is part of a network of local grassroots volunteers who hold their elected officials accountable for their votes. We grew from a gathering of eight scared women in 2017 to a following of over 500 other volunteers, donors and activists. Indivisible is growing at a fast pace as friends and neighbors join to protect our democracy and the rule of law in our nation.
If you live in Mississippi, and you want to work to build a multi-racial, multi-ethnic democracy, we invite you to sign up for news and updates at www.indivisiblenems.org. Sign up for the weekly Indivisible Newsletter. Find us on Facebook, Instagram and Bluesky.
A native of Mobile, Alabama, Mary Jane Meadows was born and raised on Mobile Bay, Dog River, and Alligator Bayou. Meadows pursued her higher education at Auburn University, University of Alabama at Birmingham, and received her B.A. at University of Mississippi in 2006 at the age of 54. In 2017, Meadows, with seven others, founded an all volunteer, non-partisan, grassroots group, Indivisible Northeast Mississippi. This local group is part of the nationwide network of over 2000 groups of Indivisible national. The Northeast Mississippi group now has a member base of 550 followers, and 30-50 members meet monthly. Ms. Meadows is a Certified Yoga Instructor, a Master Gardener, and an active member of the Episcopal Church. As one of the keepers of culture in her extended family, Meadows is currently writing a family history and memoir. Ms. Meadows is part of a family with five adult children and seven grandchildren. She and her husband of 10 years, Reed Hillen, reside in Tupelo, MS.
One year ago:
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Mississippi Native: Laura Heller
"I know I am lucky that my family is part of what makes Mississippi home for me, as well as a circle of friends who continue to stay here to fight for LGBTQ+ equality."
Such an impressive woman who recognizes that her "True Home" is within herself but is committed to important political work!
Great questionnaire! Encouraging and engaging.