THE EPIPHANY occurred a few weeks ago. I was in the Sun newsroom, strolling past a pair of sober-looking business writers, guys in suits and white shirts, ties knotted neatly. They were speaking with a woman from the sports department. I figured she was getting an investment tip, some advice on a mutual fund.

Then I heard one of the guys say: "Yeah, it would have been a lot different if Ricky Rudd hadn't come up on his tail like that."

Ricky Rudd?

They were talking about stock car racing, rehash- ing the previous weekend's NASCAR event as if it had been Game 7 of the World Series.

That's when it hit me: Redneck culture has taken over America. All the things that, years ago, a North Carolina boy intuitively knew he'd have to leave behind if he was ever to be accepted in a wider world have become trendy, popular, mainstream. And the more I looked around, the more I realized that the evidence was everywhere, like some vine creep of kudzu grown wild overnight.

For starters, look who's running the country: A paunchy skirt-chaser from the foot of the Ozarks. His key political sage? A loudmouth known as "The Ragin' Cajun."

The top guy in the Senate is a former cheerleader from Ole Miss. As for the House, its members might have gotten rid of that pudgy Georgia boy named Newt, but then they had to try out a quiet philanderer from Louisiana before finally settling on someone north of the Gnat Line (if you can call Illinois an improvement).

Who's running for president? Take your pick among front-runners -- one is from Texas, the other from Tennessee, not to be confused with the other candidate from Tennessee who wears plaid farmer shirts, or the third guy from Tennessee who decided not to run because, well, there were just too many guys from Tennessee running. Then there's the breakthrough woman candidate, with that sweet-talking accent she picked up in a North Carolina mill town. Call her Liddy.

Turn on your radio, and what are the things that just won't go away? Country music and Rush Limbaugh clones, the latter crowd endorsing everything from your right to own a whole bunch of guns to the pleasures of puffing, Boss-Hawg-style, on "premium cigars."

Television isn't much different. The nation's top-rated cable shows during a recent week featured NASCAR and pro wrasslin'. Throw in bass fishing, and you've got the Holy Trinity of Dogpatch.

The open road offers no escape. Ruling the highway are fleets of glorified pickup trucks and four-wheel drives -- only instead of displaying gun racks and "USA 1" tags, they've got stickers for Bryn Mawr and Boys' Latin.

What's the biggest snack treat to hit Baltimore recently, not to mention Manhattan? It's a deep-fried doughnut from North Carolina called the Krispy Kreme. And the latest boomlet in top-line restaurants is the steakhouse, a place where folks grill thick slabs of meat (the bloodier, the better) and where there's usually a humidor at the bar.

How does America shop these days? From home. Just like when the Sears catalog doubled as bathroom accessory and indispensable consumer tool, for those of us who lived too far from the city to drive in the pickup to shop. For those who still bother to get off the couch, there's always Wal-Mart, a chain launched in Arkansas.

And how did we neglect to mention the reigning force of intimidation in politics these days? It's the Christian right, those evangelical folks who not so long ago had to sneak from town to town in tents.

Then there's NASCAR, toasted from New York to Hollywood, with every state in America seemingly building, or wanting to build, a racetrack. Jeff Gordon is the new Michael Jordan. If you're seeking an alternative, redneck-to-the-core roller derby is back.

Sigh.

Time was, a fellow growing up in the nation's outer reaches figured that the only way to make a mark in life was to conquer the big city, preferably New York. As the song says, if you could make it there, you could make it anywhere. That's why for decades Southerners marched north so their fellow Americans could make fun of the way they talked.

Now, perhaps, the day is nigh when New York mothers will fondly kiss their sons and daughters goodbye on the doorstep of urban ruin, then lovingly help them aboard Greyhounds bound for places like Darlington, Tupelo, Macon and Gastonia.

As for all us longtime refugees from the hinterlands, schooled -- by a Southern novelist -- to believe that "you can't go home again," the new message is more accepting, but no less daunting: "You don't need to go home again. Home has swallowed America."

Dan Fesperman, a native of the Tar Heel State, is a reporter for The Sun.

Pub Date: 03/28/99