The whole point, really, is the melting pot Lady Liberty espouses. We're all ingredients in the stew; of different backgrounds before the plunge, and yet the same somehow as we assimilate. Or at least that's what the cosmic manual says.

So how come it feels as though sometimes other parts of our country feel so ... estranged?

Let me explain. This past Saturday was a spiritual experience. It hadn't happened in a while. Just me and my best friend, otherwise known as the remote, enjoying a day of sports watching. No distractions. Just yours truly and a day of college football.

I watched parts of Georgia Tech-Syracuse, Florida-Mississippi, Kentucky-Auburn, Kansas State-Oklahoma, Louisville-Pittsburgh, Mississippi State-LSU, Texas State-BC (hallelujah, the beloved Eagles won) and Tennessee-South Carolina.

Here is what I noticed: The contrasts between the north and the south might have tempted Lady Liberty to forsake her pose with the torch and instead belt a few of souls upside the head with it.

Lady Liberty, a beacon of tolerance, also seems a beacon of prudence if you ask me. That's why, seeing as though she'd probably like to keep all her constituents healthy, she'd have approved of the games in Syracuse, Pittsburgh and Chestnut Hill. They allowed no fans. This has been the consistent northern response to COVID-19. Some perhaps view the no-fans thing as somewhere between wimpy and fatalistic. But with everything we still don't know about the virus, discretion feels the smarter play. The dearth of infection rates up here support the conclusion, too.

Then there were the games in Oxford, Auburn, Norman, Baton Rouge and Columbia. All the locales — below the Mason-Dixon line — allowed a percentage of fans inside their respective stadiums. They were supposed to wear masks and use the entirety of the stadiums to practice social distancing.

Cue the Beastie Boys: "You gotta fight (fight) for your right (right) to parrrr-tay!" COVID SCHMOVID.

Aside from the cheerleaders and band members, few others in the crowds wore anything on their faces except expressions. Maybe it was too hot for masks. Or maybe they just didn't care.

But when considering the Lady Liberty thing again — and how we should accept varying opinions and behaviors here in the melting pot — it still makes me wonder about the completely disparate views about the virus, mask wearing and social responsibility in general.

I mean, are we really all part of the same country?

Brings me back to my UConn days. I spent five years on the UConn women's beat. We did the Johnny Cash/we've been everywhere man thing. All over the country, including the south. We did Tennessee, Georgia, South Carolina, Louisiana, Texas, Oklahoma and Kentucky, among other stops.

Everyone was very nice. Southern hospitality and all that. Nobody seemed to be in a hurry. All food was fried. It was the law. Had Easter dinner once in a Waffle House. I had mac and cheese in Monroe, La. that was so good it nearly made me weep. I even felt a little guilty for my perpetual northeastern impatience.

But something about the south always made me uneasy. It's like Geno Auriemma said once before a game at Louisiana Tech. He met the officials a few minutes before tipoff. Each one had a thicker southern drawl than the next. He turned to Chris Dailey and cracked, "we have no chance."

(I still laugh at that to this day.)

Still, I can't quite understand why the Mason-Dixon line creates such stark boundaries and outlooks. The Civil War ended some time ago. (Or did it?) Maybe it's the conservative-liberal thing. Much of the south is red; much of the north is blue. But even here, the most ardent conservatives I know wear masks in public. I get the feeling that's not necessarily the case in, you know, Tuscaloosa.

Author James McBride, who wrote the award winning memoir "The Color of Water," made this observation about the south: "It was always so hot, and everyone was so polite, and everything was all surface but underneath it was like a bomb waiting to go off. I always felt that way about the South, that beneath the smiles and southern hospitality and politeness were a lot of guns and liquor and secrets."

Not that there's anything wrong with guns, liquor and secrets. I'm just astonished at how something as chaste as a football game could delineate just how differently portions of our country view things.

This is the opinion of Day sports columnist Mike DiMauro