The illusion

Watering the crops

This is product placement. It's our Honda Civic that we're loving. I forgot to put this in last week - I took this shot of our car in West Virginia. For anyone interested, here we are. We don't have a name for it yet, though. Any ideas? It's a teal car. Last week, my brothers reminded me that my Grandfather cautioned us about teal cars, "they always pass on the right." We've been careful not to live up to this expectation.

We've seen many empty and deserted stores like this. 

Old school McDonalds. 

Sunflowers on route 61

A one-man-show Church just outside of Vicksburg. 

The Mississippi river from Vicksburg - you can see it's quite a steep and easily defensible hill (or should be).

Alex,"Is this our home, now?"

For any sophomores (and sophomore teachers, too!) that may be viewing this blog - this is a 21st century electric map. It doesn't have the heart and soul of the electric map at Gettysburg, but it helped us understand the battle just the same.

Vicksburg National Park. Yankee canons. Pemberton had a chat with Grant here on July 3rd, 1863.

One of the yankee trenches that Grant's soldiers dug for their 2nd and last assault on Vicksburg (before they tried the war of attrition method).

Natchez Trace trail.

Alex on top of Emerald Mound.

Way off in the distance you can see a speck of blue - that is Alex. Eleni is a bit miffed that he is there and she is not. Understandable. It's the hand on the hip that I am particularly fond of...

Thursday, July 3, 2008

I should mention that I finally did some laundry last night; we’ve been traveling for 9 days now and it was definitely time. I was all psyched up for this job, as I love laundry mats. All sorts of people and situations wander in and out of them. But, not so much in Oxford, MS. In fact, it was absolutely empty. Just a slot machine for changing dollars into quarters. All my expectations completely dashed. Sadness.

We’re on Route 6 West. Beautiful old mansions. In some cases, just next door – shacks made from aluminum siding and wood. Along the way we passed orchards of fruit trees, irrigation systems, corn around 3 feet tall, The Tallahatchie River, soybeans, and a shack in a grove of trees that had a sign on it “Golf.” Baskets of balls and some clubs next to it.

Eleni, “Why are we doing this?” We didn’t press her further. We still are trying to live in the illusion that the kids are enjoying this.

Alex points out the mirages in the road…

Neil and I gave country music another shot. All was well until we heard lyrics that went something like this – “I’m 47 years old. 27 years I was free and 20 years on death row. I shot my girlfriend and watched her die.” Right. Music off. But, Alex has been stuck on this brief 2-second blip in his life for some time now…”I thought when he said girlfriend that they were going to get married. Maybe she died by accident?” So much for country. We did try again.

Route 61 is also called Desoto Trail. The Spanish Conquistador Hernando De Soto explored this area in 1541.

We arrived in Clarksdale and saw the 2 blue guitars at the crossroads that symbolize where Robert Johnson sold his soul to the devil (corner of Route 49 and 61). Following the signs for downtown Clarksdale found us smack in the middle of some of the most abject poverty in the United States that we’ve seen… it was hard to drive around in our new car with our new camera and our relatively new and clean clothes. So, you’ll have to pardon me while I stumble through writing about this.

I’ve always believed that one of the best ways to learn is to get yourself out of your comfort zone. Here we are. The more we head into the deep south, and the more we separate ourselves from our familiar east coast, the more I wish I had an invisible cloak. But, that isn’t it. It’s more that I wish I could change it all, and like a quick fix band-aid for Eleni, “make it all better.” I’m not sure that is it either. Saying that suggests that it’s all wrong. It’s not. It’s just very different from what we are used to in our pocket of New Jersey. We’re out of our comfort zone.

Getting out of old Clarksdale and heading on to Route 61 South was more familiar. Here’s the newer Clarksdale where we saw the usual sights of Burger King and KFC. You’ll have to forgive me, but instead of getting coffee at the local restaurant in the old town, we settled for another McDonalds. The kids settled in on the play area – right in the middle of a family saying goodbye after a weeklong reunion in a prayer circle embrace.

We continued on the flat route 61 through the town named Alligator. We stopped in Hollandale for gas. Next door was a Church with the sign, “Give the devil an inch. He will be your ruler.” We drove past pawnshops and more make shift yard sales in empty abandoned storefronts.

Eleni, “the car is hurting me.” We're still not sure what that means, but she says it every so often. Again, we are still trying to live in the illusion.

Vicksburg. The Confederacy held out for 47 days against the Union siege in 1863. After driving through main town, on the waterfront, and all around the battlefield, I can now see why this city was called the Gibraltar of the Confederacy. Its position on the river combined with steep hills, build it up into a natural castle position. Pemberton surrendered on July 3rd – 145 years ago today! The final surrender took place on July 4th. The same day that Robert E. Lee was marching out of Gettysburg, PA. The Anaconda plan appealed to Alex, and we spent some time discussing something I rarely do (and hardly do well), military strategy. He’s hooked. With all of the different time periods that we have been moving in and out of on this trip, I really wonder how much sense this is making. But, he seems to get it (Thanks to some good grounding in celebrating President’s Day at school since age 3. Thanks CDC and KRS! Abraham Lincoln is already fixed in his mind as one of the biggest heroes of all time. I should also mention that the same held true for our visit to the Civil Rights Museum – Alex already had a great base of knowledge about Martin Luther King jr. and Rosa Parks. He knew the stories well and he had some very strong ideas about who were the good guys and bad guys. Hmmmm…this was the harder part of the conversation. He’s got it in his head that there were definite “teams.” “Mommy, was Nebraska on our team?” This is the part that is harder to make sense of… we’ll wait a few years for that lesson on different perspectives to take hold.).

We ate lunch in an1890 building called Unique Impressions on Main Street in old town Vicksburg. We were definitely in local territory – Plates of mashed potatoes, chicken, corn bread, gravy, and all that. For dessert – Peach cobbler. Vicksburg has expanded in its vision for the future; people visit this town for more than its Civil War stories. They have added casinos and some factory outlets even.

We traveled on route 61 for another half hour and then took the Natchez Trace Trail towards Natchez. This ancient American Indian trail follows a diagonal line across Tennessee, Alabama, and Mississippi. It was a footpath at first for the Chickasaw and Choctaw Nations, and then it became a popular pioneer road known as the Old Southwest Trail. We picked it up at its last 30 miles. It’s quiet, and it's a peaceful break from the billboards of route 61. Neil has been reading Blue Highways by William Least Heat-Moon, and he said "For miles no power lines or billboards. Just tree, rock, water, bush, and road. The Trace, like a river, followed natural contours and gave focus to the land; it so brought out the beauty that every road commissioner in the nation should drive the Trace to see that highway does not have to outrage landscape." Well put. But, if I am being honest here, I should mention that while this patch of land was beautiful, it was hard to drive in the hazy afternoon. It lulled me into a strong desire for a nap. A billboard or two might have been more stimulating. Sorry William Least Heat-Moon.

We stopped at Emerald Mound, which is the 2nd largest Temple Mound in the USA. The Natchez Indians used it in the 1300s-1600s. Alex was up the mound within seconds it seemed. Much to the chagrin of his sister, he then proceeded to run to the next mound. She followed, of course. Neil and I climbed the first one, and tried to find some shade while our children ran around silly.

Found a hotel in Natchez, had a picnic on the bed in our room, and then swam for almost a full 2 hours. We didn't need to fool ourselves with any illusion here - they were completely happy!