I spent rush hour in Cumberland County, Tennessee, somewhere between Nashville and Knoxville. Rush hour arrives in Cumberland with about as much fanfare as the Muslim Hajj. Maybe sometime, someone heard something about a bunch of people moving around at the same time for some unknown purpose. But nobody really understood why or believed that such a thing went on in the world. It passes unnoticed. Needless to say, this was good timing on my part.
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| Loosely translated, this sign reads "Next Exit, Cool Springs Mall." |
Look at this Pho-to-Graph! While I did not have time to explore and experience the important historical sites passed along the way, I'm certainly not above pulling over to the side of any road in any vehicle for unexpected photo opportunities that present themselves on the side of the road. Traffic, pride, parking accommodations be damned.
Unfortunately, in what was a major oversight, my camera was packed somewhere in the madness of the back of the Uhaul. Given the questionable structural integrity of my packing at the beginning of the trip and the possibility of contents shifting during flight, I thought it best not to attempt to recover it.
Along the Interstates, everything basically looks the same. But once I pulled off south of Nashville onto highway 45...there's stuff. As part of the as-yet-unplanned return trip where I will take in the wonders of the Natural Bridge and Rock City, a ready camera will be a necessity. Somewhere outside of Jackson, Tennessee, I passed by a burned-out shell of a house with a swimming pool slide still standing behind it. With the right angle, it could've looked like a slide that let out directly into the doorway of the house. It was almost enough to get me to tempt unleashing the chaos of the truck cargo bay to get to the camera.
Green and White Jesus. They started appearing somewhere around Nashville, gained strength outside Jackson, but persisted throughout most of midwestern Tennessee. Green yard signs that just said "JESUS" in white block lettering. No context, no further information. Just "JESUS." There's some political campaign yard sign company that has come up with a brilliant gimmick for keeping up business in the off season. It'd be like a a heart-shaped candy maker replacing "Be Mine" with "Get Saved" in an effort to keep the factory running all year.
During the mid-90s in Mississippi, there was a fad of PVC signs with mini-marquee letter slots. People would put them in their yards with excerpts from scripture. It was the early predecessor to Tim Tebow's eye black (which never made use of the darker side of the Bible. For Tennessee weekend or an away game into Death Valley, you gotta break out the Revelations). But at least that made sense as a statement of faith. You had to actually crack a Bible and pick out a verse and a passage. "This is something that means something to me, go check it out." The JESUS signs are just lazy tokens that come dangerously close to using the Lord's name in vain. It's just blunt, meaningless space-filler put into the world for lack of anything else to say; the yard decoration equivalent of hitting your thumb with a hammer and muttering "Christ" under your breath as you grab your hand.
Green and White Houses. At the opposite end of the green and white yard sign blasphemies are the green and white houses. And they are also all along this stretch of road. Green roof, white trim, double chimney houses. The white brick or wood or stucco show age, but not in a cheap way. It's a classic deterioration, like silver hair behind the ears. It's more establishment than neglect. It's that aging that sets apart the true estates from the cheap vinyl siding imitations, which just end up looking like unbrushed teeth after 2 years.
Green and White Vegetation. If there hasn't been a country song to use the phrase "like a dogwood in the pines," it's for sale for a low, low royalty. In rows and rows of green roadside pine trees, the sparse blooming white dogwoods are brilliantly conspicuous.
"I saw her there at the 7th grade dance like a dogwood among the pines." It's got Tim McGraw megahit written all over it. Perhaps "Evergreen Love" could be the title. It's the next "Don't Take The Girl." This isn't meant derisively. I have a sad, soft spot for bad country. I just want to contribute to the genre.
Or, if you could even go Southern gothic edgy, "The line of blow laid upon the piles of cash like a dogwood in the pines and his ears filled with the roar of an I-20 log truck."
In Twitter literature, there's no need to put in the work of doing complete novels. Just catchlines, similes and metaphors sold separately to fill out whatever existing framework you already have in place. 99 cents per phrase.
Holly Springs Swamp Land. Speaking of bad country lyrics, I've got some good swamp land for sale in Holly Springs. There it was, a "For Sale" sign on the roadside from ReMax claiming an investment opportunity. It wasn't just mildly moist land or some seasonal flooding. This was swamp. Probably at least hip deep, cypress knee dotted swamp. I assume you'd buy it to hunt ducks or farm crawfish or dispose of bodies, but I couldn't think of anything but Monty Python's Holy Grail, because I'm a British teenager from 1975.
Betty Davis, Whore of the Free Market. Bette Davis had eyes that were song worthy and is a symbol of early Hollywood beauty. Betty Davis is a shack right on the Marshall County line, marking the course to Oxford like the edge of the Holy Land. It's a monument to the fact that people will drive for cold beer and warmed-over ribs. In Oxford, where cold beer is illegal and no beer is legal on Sunday, Betty Davis, slut that she is, has made a comfortable living picking up the needs that can't be filled in proper incorporated society.
The debate stretches across generations, disciplines and social strata of Ole Miss attendees and still remains unsolved. Hotly and passionately debated among scholars and slackers, everyone with a strong, unrelenting dogmatic belief one way or the other-- If one group of foresight-lacking college kids buys a case of warm beer in Oxford and puts it in ice and another group of kids drives out to Betty Davis to purchase a cold case, which one will get to the baseball outfield with the coldest beverages before first pitch? Like the enigma of the Tootsie Pop, we may never know.
Take Me Back, To Oxford Mississippi. I see her. I know she's there. She probably doesn't really remember me. Probably doesn't care or wouldn't notice, if I just zipped by without a second glance. She's moved on. I, sadly, haven't.
And so, I have no choice but to swerve a little out of the way to stop in and gawk for a while at the sundress in the breeze that is the Oxford Square. I meet up with an old friend who still is lucky enough to maintain an honest and productive existence in Oxford and we head to lunch. There are some who don't believe in the legend of the fat vegetarian. It's understandable. I mean, not everybody's been to Ajax Diner.
The meatloaf is good. The catfish, better than average. All manner of sandwiches and chicken fried steak and burgers and they're all solid, classic comfort food selections. But the star is the veggies. Fried eggplant, fried okra, cheese fries (veggie? sure), squash casserole, hash brown casserole, cornbread dressing, butter beans, turnip greens, mac and cheese, fresh tomatoes with homemade mayonaise (sadly, not in season at the time of this visit)...oh man. It's food coma-inducing vegetation and starch and clearly outshines the proteins. Fewer animals would need to die if more places did vegetables like Ajax. We have sweet tea and catfish with extra tartar sauce and talk about times just far away enough to sound like lies. And then, it's time to load back up into the Uhaul.
New Orleans is the end of the road. There's still a little way to go, but the rest is familiar and could be done on autopilot. Treebeard had it right. I like going South. Somehow, it feels like going downhill.
Green and White Houses. At the opposite end of the green and white yard sign blasphemies are the green and white houses. And they are also all along this stretch of road. Green roof, white trim, double chimney houses. The white brick or wood or stucco show age, but not in a cheap way. It's a classic deterioration, like silver hair behind the ears. It's more establishment than neglect. It's that aging that sets apart the true estates from the cheap vinyl siding imitations, which just end up looking like unbrushed teeth after 2 years.
Green and White Vegetation. If there hasn't been a country song to use the phrase "like a dogwood in the pines," it's for sale for a low, low royalty. In rows and rows of green roadside pine trees, the sparse blooming white dogwoods are brilliantly conspicuous.
"I saw her there at the 7th grade dance like a dogwood among the pines." It's got Tim McGraw megahit written all over it. Perhaps "Evergreen Love" could be the title. It's the next "Don't Take The Girl." This isn't meant derisively. I have a sad, soft spot for bad country. I just want to contribute to the genre.
In Twitter literature, there's no need to put in the work of doing complete novels. Just catchlines, similes and metaphors sold separately to fill out whatever existing framework you already have in place. 99 cents per phrase.
Holly Springs Swamp Land. Speaking of bad country lyrics, I've got some good swamp land for sale in Holly Springs. There it was, a "For Sale" sign on the roadside from ReMax claiming an investment opportunity. It wasn't just mildly moist land or some seasonal flooding. This was swamp. Probably at least hip deep, cypress knee dotted swamp. I assume you'd buy it to hunt ducks or farm crawfish or dispose of bodies, but I couldn't think of anything but Monty Python's Holy Grail, because I'm a British teenager from 1975.
Betty Davis, Whore of the Free Market. Bette Davis had eyes that were song worthy and is a symbol of early Hollywood beauty. Betty Davis is a shack right on the Marshall County line, marking the course to Oxford like the edge of the Holy Land. It's a monument to the fact that people will drive for cold beer and warmed-over ribs. In Oxford, where cold beer is illegal and no beer is legal on Sunday, Betty Davis, slut that she is, has made a comfortable living picking up the needs that can't be filled in proper incorporated society.
Take Me Back, To Oxford Mississippi. I see her. I know she's there. She probably doesn't really remember me. Probably doesn't care or wouldn't notice, if I just zipped by without a second glance. She's moved on. I, sadly, haven't.
And so, I have no choice but to swerve a little out of the way to stop in and gawk for a while at the sundress in the breeze that is the Oxford Square. I meet up with an old friend who still is lucky enough to maintain an honest and productive existence in Oxford and we head to lunch. There are some who don't believe in the legend of the fat vegetarian. It's understandable. I mean, not everybody's been to Ajax Diner.
The meatloaf is good. The catfish, better than average. All manner of sandwiches and chicken fried steak and burgers and they're all solid, classic comfort food selections. But the star is the veggies. Fried eggplant, fried okra, cheese fries (veggie? sure), squash casserole, hash brown casserole, cornbread dressing, butter beans, turnip greens, mac and cheese, fresh tomatoes with homemade mayonaise (sadly, not in season at the time of this visit)...oh man. It's food coma-inducing vegetation and starch and clearly outshines the proteins. Fewer animals would need to die if more places did vegetables like Ajax. We have sweet tea and catfish with extra tartar sauce and talk about times just far away enough to sound like lies. And then, it's time to load back up into the Uhaul.
New Orleans is the end of the road. There's still a little way to go, but the rest is familiar and could be done on autopilot. Treebeard had it right. I like going South. Somehow, it feels like going downhill.
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