Southern Gothic Mbti
Intj: The Reverend. A hulking figure in black, the kind of person who was born to be an intimidating silhouette. His voice is bass thunder, and when he tells his flock to repent, shivers shoot down everyone’s spines. He seems absolutely, nearly intimately, certain of God, and absolutely, almost intimately certain that God is terrifying. It always seems like it storms more when he is angry about something.
Entj: A sharp old woman with a high collar and a pair of knitting needles that glint like daggers. The way they clink together always make you shiver a little. She’s rich- owns half the land around here and says she’s got important friends in the city who want to “develop” it. She’s got big plans for this place, she says. She scolds you for playing in the creek on her land and the night after you play in the creek you have a nightmare that her important friends from the city come down, and that her important friends from the city are buzzards, and they fly, cackling, in a tornado formation, gobbling up all the places you love.
Esfj: The way her eyes twinkle when she sparks up a conversation makes you nervous, but she makes the best sweet tea in town, and you can never seem to resist sitting down with her to have a glass. You find miasma of lilac scented perfume, gazing into her soft, heavily powdered face. “Bless your little heart” she says when the conversation is over. As you walk away from her porch, you realize that you don’t remember what exactly you just talked about, but you have a sinking feeling you might have told her a secret or two about yourself.
Isfj: on the edge of town there is a kind-eyed old man who lives alone. He whittles animals out of wood. He makes corn-husk dolls and apple dolls and he will give them to children who visit him. People she their heads and sigh when they talk about him- he talks about his wife like she’s still alive. He makes her dinner and buys her new clothes. Every once in awhile somebody will mention that the dirt on his wife’s grave is a little lumpier than than it was when she was first buried- like somebody had been digging there. But nobody ever talks about that for very long. afterall, he ain’t hurting nobody. Best to leave these things alone.
Intp: In class and in church she is quiet, often teased. A face overly solemn for a little girl, and two long, but the inside of her room looks like madness and wonder. it is full of pressed butterflies and jars with stick insects or dormant cocoons. With dried leaves and jars of elderberries. With junebug shells. With fossils. Sometimes when boys make fun of her, they notice later that day that their milk at lunchtime tastes a little funny, and from the other side of the playground, her nose in a book, she smirks. She’s a concocter, and she’s brewing something big- one day, they’ll all see what she can do.
Entp: He can talk up a storm, that one. As a kid he had a reputation for telling tales but they thought he’d grow out of it. He never did, really. His ideas just got bigger and wilder and now he remains a charming scoundrel- he’ll tell you he’s building a hot air balloon and he’s going to fly it all the way to Chicago. He’ll tell you he made a special kind of glasses that lets you see people’s bones. He will tell you these things you’ll only half know whether he’s joking or not.
Istj: the middle aged schoolteacher with the tight bun, the drab clothes, the soft voice, and the forgettable face. Used to be people would feel sorry for her, or walk all over her. Until one day funny things started happening in the school house- the kids would hear a gravelly voice laughing around lunch time. They’d come in the morning to see jagged claw marks down the door. Erasers would fly through the air and chills would rush through the room during long division lessons. “This is my school house,” she said, “And I won’t have any haints in it.” Everyone laughed at her, but they say the next night she walked up the hill alone to the schoolhouse, with eight carefully sharpened stakes, a cross, some chalk and some big bundles of thorny plants. And they say the next day she came back home with a black eye and her hair all messed up. And everything was back to normal in the schoolhouse after that, but she walks with a slight limp now.
Estj: The best hunter and trapper in town, with a house full of trophies and taxidermied animals. It seems, sometimes, like he can’t talk about anything else besides the things he’s killed. He wears lots of hair grease, and has a sharp part and a sweaty handsomeness. Lots of the girls in town are always trying to court him- you think he smells always like raw meat. You notice that there is always just a little bit of blood coming out from under his fingernails.
Infj: the old blind lady who is always on her porch in a green rocking chair. if you water her ferns for her, she will fish you out a sticky peppermint from the jar she keeps beside her, and then she’ll clasp your hand, quote a verse of the bible and tell you what you need to watch out for in the future. (“watch out for them crows,” “watch out for the way the creek looks at you sideways”) no one has ever seen the inside of her house, and no one remembers a time when she was not old.
enfj: she knows your mama. She knows everybody’s mama. She is the queen of big hats and knowing people’s mamas. She makes all the church brochures and she is very concerned with the state of everyone’s soul and she says “you behave now- I’ve got eyes everywhere you know.” And you thought it was a figure of speech but sometimes you’ll look at a milk snake or an owl and their eyes will seem too green, the wrong shape, and a little bit… familiar.
Esfp: Everyone calls her “granny” but she’s nobody’s granny really. She could be anywhere from 45-85, her face a little leathery and well laugh lined. She walks with a knobby walking stick and carries a mother of pearl flask with her wherever she goes. She spends most of her time sitting outside the corner store flirting with the farmers in their overalls. If you pay her a couple dollars to go buy a little more booze, she’ll tell you a dirty joke.
Isfp: “No good,” your mama tells you, “will ever come of that one.” But there is something about the way the isfp looks, isn’t there, hunkered down behind the schoolhouse aloofly and effortlessly smoking a stolen cigarette. You’ve taken to hanging around with him- Only then came the night he drank half a jar of moonshine on his own, punched the wall of his barn until his knuckles were bloody, cussed the moon for hours. You were a little scared then, but you already love him, and you always will; it’s too late, now.
Enfp: everyone is in love with her. She is wild, beautiful, creative, and always going barefoot. Plays a mean banjo, likes to dance in mud puddles, and seems as though she might be made of sunlight. She says she dreams of running off to the city, she writes poetry in a red notebook and wants to get it published in magazines. When she goes, there will be conspicuous absences, the smell of just-after-a-rain, everyone will wonder if she was ever real.
Infp: the youngest Kelly boy has always been a little off, bless him. Not like the other kids. The way he never smiles and barely speaks, just stares into the distance, no matter how much the others pinch him take his toys. He never cries when they hurt him, and has a pet mouse that he keeps in the front pocket of his overalls.sometimes he says he sees people that aren’t there, sometimes he looks scared and says he sees people with no faces, and his mama tells him to hush.
Istp: the town drunk’s tomboy daughter comes swaggering up the road in overalls, and you spot her from the porch. She waves at you, hops your fence. “Got a secret” she says, and she opens her palm. In her hand is a pocket watch with initials on it that aren’t hers, and two human teeth. She grins, and her gums dripping crimson. she’s been fighting again. She’ll be fighting her whole life.
Estp: Every summer, around June, a vacuum cleaner in a sharp pinstripe suit comes to town. Knocks on all the doors and talks about politics in a reedy voice before showing you the latest model of the Hoovermatic 8000. Year after year, the newest model is always the Hoovermatic 8000. He makes good conversation, but there’s something strange about his face. Too many teeth? Smile too big? Everyone always knows not to invite him inside, but nobody ever tells you why.
