Southern Exposure

January 2014



Holidays are about traditions. And no one clings to holiday traditions more desperately than lonely, childless uncles and aunts. That would be Anne and I. We have convinced ourselves that our visit is the highlight of the season. That remains to be seen. Regardless, we make our annual New Year's swing through the South and test the hospitality and patience of relatives from Virginia to the Carolinas. Like 2% milk, we have expiration dates. Our trips are carefully crafted in order to leave while we are still consumable … there is nothing worse than when a visiting aunt or uncle starts to "turn" …  we spoil so easily.

That said, we headed south a few days before Xmas for our New Year's rendezvous in Simpsonville. Our goals … family … adventure … the ocean  … and relaxation. On the down side would be about 2500 miles of driving.  I will say this from the start, being a trip planner is a thankless task. When one plans thoroughly and efficiently, presenting a detailed spreadsheet of the ensuing trip to one's traveling companion(s), ridicule, rather than thanks, is generally the case. My spreadsheet of joy was a brilliant design … and much maligned as was I.

The worst thing about our visits to the South is getting there. Generally, it is a power drive … 8-17 straight hours of interstates. We are usually too intent on our final destination to divert for entertainment along the way. This time, however, we planned for stops in Roanoke and Asheville before reaching our Simpsonville destination.

                         

We stopped for the first night in Lexington, VA and dined at the Southern Inn Restaurant. We wasted no time acclimating our palettes to Southern specialties … in this case, one of the best pecan pies I had ever tasted. We gauged our time the next morning to arrive at opening time in Roanoke at the Taubman Art Museum in the downtown area. The Taubman was beautifully designed … the building, a piece of art in and of itself. The Imagine Peace Exhibit of Yoko Ono, a wonderful children's' exploration area, and a photo exhibit on the Civil Rights Voter Registration Campaign as captured by 7 major photographers of the period made the visit well worth the time. The operative words for lunch were "hot" and "dog".  Though our initial efforts for a dog at the Ole Mule Hot Dog Company were unsuccessful, we soon found a satisfactory replacement and enjoyed the first of many mandatory hot dogs for the trip.

The afternoon found us back on the road and on the way to Abingdon, VA to visit Anne's Uncle Jim and Aunt Peg before heading through the mountains to Asheville, NC in a heavy fog and rain. We arrived  only to find that I had booked the hotel for the wrong nights and virtually all of Asheville (at least what we could afford) was booked. All but, the Mountaineer Inn! On first inspection, we surmised the Inn to be a West Virginia version of the Bates Motel, transplanted into the mountains of Western NC in the late 50's and preserved as such by some inexplicable time warp. It was a place to stay … we did survive …  that is all I will say.

We decided the next morning to relocate to another hotel and once established, we headed to Chimney Rock near Bat Cave, NC.  I admit … we were not in complete agreement about the wisdom of heading to a mountain park in a dense fog. I assured Anne that the rain would stop and the fog clear. It wasn't until we actually pulled into the parking lot at the top of the mountain that the fog lifted. Amazing.








The sign at the park entrance informed us that the elevator to the viewing area at the top was out of order.  The stairways to the top were extensive and the views along the way were magnificent. We relished the exercise. However, Anne did mention later that there were 540 steps … but who's counting?









From Chimney Rock, we headed to Flat Rock, NC to see the Carl Sandburg Homestead and Museum. The Sandburg Homestead is a gorgeous setting. We toured the homestead and the goat operation that his wife established on site . The Sandburgs definitely lived a secluded and low-key lifestyle in Flat Rock. Interestingly, when Carl moved to the homestead very little renovation was done to the existing house other than to build bookshelves for his 17,000 volume book collection.




There was no use hanging around the Sandburg Homestead any further. We concluded our visit back in the Asheville area just kicking around town and enjoying the restaurant scene. We tried a tapas restaurant, Zambra, for dinner and a Cuban restaurant, Havana, for lunch. There are many more restaurants worth exploring in the area on another visit.
















Next stop … Simpsonville, SC and Smokey, Kerri, Barrett, Quinn and Putter. Game On! By this, I mean the game was on … the football game … my cup runneth over. The Game was on in a broader sense as well. … our Xmas celebration … the New Year's Celebration with fireworks … and a hiking adventure for Quinn and I.

We wasted no time getting to the Xmas presents having contained ourselves until dinner was over. I love to do special wrapping, especially for the kids. For Quinn, I used doll faces, driftwood, artificial flowers and multiple layers of Saran Wrap to extend the time it took him to open his books about the prior three hiking adventures we had had.








I also created a present monster which could not be unwrapped. Instead, Barrett and Quinn had to reach  inside the the monster's mouth and into it's stomach (I had wet the entryway for realism) to retrieve three small gifts that the monster had allegedly eaten.










Later, we also got a chance to see both kids in action with their new motor bike and 4-wheeler that they kept at granddad's house.

                   


                  

The next day, while dad watched the game and the girls shopped for stuff for the New Year's Eve celebration, Quinn and I went on our hike. This was the fourth of our hikes together. Each of the prior hikes had a theme. First, we were in search of dinosaurs … then Sasquatch. Next, was the Señor Citizen Hike and the story of Juan Exaggerito and his pal, Pe Pe Pantalones. This year, our hike was The Lone Stranger and Pronto in search of Black Fart.  As usual, we had a great hike.














It was New Year's Eve and soon the party would begin.  Decorations were hung throughout the house and the guys drove to Anderson to get just the right combination of fireworks. Naturally, we overdid it. We lit up the sky with sparkles and color and deafened anyone brave enough to come outside. We got lucky with a bomb going off prematurely without serious injury to anyone. Maybe we need to rethink the need for fireworks tradition.















We all struggled to stay awake until twelve, but somehow made it. Happy Birthday, 2014!








Like I said before, people, even or especially relatives, can only take so much of me. I mean "of Anne". It was time for us to move on. We drove to Batesburg, SC near Columbia and spent the night with my brother, Wayne, and his wife, Cheryl. This was a great time for us to analyze everyone in the family without the necessity to act upon any of our conclusions. I do believe that we were in agreement that I was the only normal one in the family and Wayne was the second-most normal. While there,  we discovered that the Peachtree Inverted Triangle Rock had turned over … now, the Peachtree turned over  rock … not exactly a tourist attraction anymore. Wayne and Cheryl took the news badly.

From Wayne's … next stop, the ocean. Thanks to the generosity of our friends, James and Lynn,  we were able to stay at their cottage at Folly Beach.  Unfortunately, we brought with us cold weather seldom seen in the Charleston area. It never occurred to me that water pipes might (and did) freeze at the beach.  











For the most part, our time at Folly Beach was spent relaxing, walking the beach, collecting seashells, and enjoying the scenery … even if it was cold. We visited Lauren and Brittain in Mt. Pleasant to check out their new house and went out to dinner with them at a new, local restaurant. We bought fresh shrimp and oysters and cooked them at the cottage.  Mitch joined us for the weekend. A friend of Mitch's lived nearby and we joined them for dinner one night. Several of the group were musicians and sang and played for several hours. It is somewhat of a shock to realize one is a senior citizen and that  his nephew feels the need to walk him back to the cottage at 11:00 PM and then return to the party. Unless of course, Mitch was only worried about Anne. We were pleasantly surprised to find out that there was  a recycling program on Folly as well as a oyster shell recycling program on James Island.



While we were at Folly, we took the opportunity to take in a few other sights. One the we enjoyed a lot was visiting the USS Yorktown at Patriot's Point in Mt. Pleasant as well as the submarine also docked there. The Yorktown was amazingly large and the submarine was amazingly small. Other exhibits included various aircraft, a prisoner -of-war exhibit, space capsules, and more. Lots to see.



We made the most of our time. We love being at the beach…  there is always something to do … like …

… taichi and yoga with your nephew























… relaxing on a secluded section of the beach















… visiting the Moon Pie Store

















… reliving Forrest Gump























… living the plantation life













… eating fried chicken and feeling like a King























Ah, the beach life … we will get there sooner or later.

Here's to you Charleston!

Gropius House and More

Anne was off to Nantucket for a few days to vista her friend, Debbie.I t was imperative that I do some kind of adventure ... just to prove that I was capable of having fun even when she was gone. I researched the Concord, MA area to see if there were several good things to see to fill a day. It looked doable.

My research kept me up a little later than I had planned, result being that I slept later the next morning as well. The first stop for my adventure was the Ralph Waldo Emerson House in Concord. In order to catch the early tour, I had to skip breakfast and go directly there. On our last trip to Concord, we had planned to visit the Emerson House, but ran out of time. We learned on that visit about Emerson's connections with the Alcotts and Hawthorne and that made us want to find out more. The tour was informative and interesting, but told me surprisingly little about Emerson's writing or his friendship with Bronson Alcott. We have been on quite a few tours of historic house lately and have been lucky to have had excellent docents at each of those places. I have to admit that the docents here were rather matter-of-fact and did not seem to have the passion for their topic like other places we have been. Nevertheless, the house is worth the visit, especially if you can combine it with the Wayside (Hawthornes' House), Orchard House (Alcott's house) and possibly Fruitlands Museum (Alcott's experiental school).

It was a short drive to Lexington for the next stop at the Gropius House. Gropius was the German architect that originated the bauhaus style of architecture. Gropius was one of the lucky ones that was able to get out of Germany in 1936 before WWII. The speculation is that when Harvard offered him the chair of the architecture department, Gropius made a case for the glory of having a German heading the architecture department at a major US university … especially since he was replacing a Frenchman. Hitler must have bought the argument for he let Gropius leave but froze all of his bank accounts. The house and the tour were great.



This is definitely a great place to visit … especially if you plan a like visit to the Freylinghusen  House in Lenox,  MA, another bauhaus style home.

If there was a flaw in this adventure plan, I would have to say it was that I built in no time for meals. Like breakfast, there was no time for lunch ... so I grabbed a couple apples from the trees at Gropius House and hit the road for the next spot, Walden Pond. I have been here a couple of times and love visiting there. Great place to just relax! Stopped by the gift shop to pick up a Thoreau t-shirt before I unloaded the kayak on the pond. Simplicity … ah, so true.













Walden Pond was beautiful … sun shining, lake calm, and toasty warm. Lots of swimmers and picnickers. Foliage around the lake was just starting to color.











                 

Couldn't resist stacking a few stones along the shoreline before I left.

One last stop before heading home for some dinner… I must admit I was getting really hungry (no disrespect to the apples).  Realized I could take a shortcut on the Mohawk Trail to get to Jacksonville and Lake Sadawaga for a little fishing before dark. Why not? 

 It was a good day.

Nantucket has nothing on me!

Senor Citizen Hike

August 14, 2013

                        

My name, if I am not known to you other than by legend alone, is Juan Exagerito, el Lobo Solitario. I will tell you a tale that upon hearing, you will not believe for I will sound mucho the big fibber and the teller of tall tales. However, having seen the proof, of which I have a very large quantity, you will know me to be the teller of a tale very bizarre.

The story, for which I chose the first page to begin, starts with a strange tale that I myself heard of a wild child, raised by the wolves they say, in the desert region outside the small village near Oaxaca. A child they called Pe Pe Pantalonies. Since he had known only the way of the wolf, Pe Pe was made to live with the dogs inside a cage outside of the local cantina. I realized that only I, el Lobo Solitario, could save him an teach him to be a human being again. Five minutes later, I was on the way home and Pe Pe Pantalonies was with me.

I set out first to teach him to be a man, mucho un hombre. Like myself. I started by teaching him the meaning of the word "work" for I am not the alms box to stick his little hand in with the gimmes. He was taught to haul laundry to the washer to earn his keep. 

Do not forget that Pe Pe was raised, not by Juan, but by the wolves with no table manners. At first, he would eat no beans ... he would eat no tortillas ... not even the chile pepper would he taste. He would only eat the food of the wolf. With this, I was with much luck for the road ran very close to mi casa and food was plentiful.

You are thinking to yourself, this job - to make a being of the human kind from a dog child, it is easy! It is I that am here to tell you this it is not so. Many books they are written by the peoples who among them all have never done such a thing as to have a child, but say to Juan anyway, "Spare the cane". It is Juan, el Lobo Solitario, that says back to them, "This is not the way of the wolf child. The wolf child's hearing improves mucho with the switching with the briar bush". 

The wolf child has only to sit once for the time out on the top of the fire ant hill to understand what Juan means by "Juan said No".

In no time, Pe Pe, his table manners, they were the finest!

He love no longer to eat the wolf food and Juan teach him to eat the organic vegetables.

                        

In no time, the wolf child was the wolf no longer. He was Pe Pe Pantalonies. He was  a man ... molded in the image of his benefactor ... his knight of the shiny armor and the white burro ... his idol ... el Lobo Solitario.

Being a parent is not the normal thing for Juan, but having owned many pets, it was not difficult for Juan to get the hang of. The most good life of the dog that Juan has heard about must not be so much the truth cause Juan's dog it did not hang around so long. Pe Pe Pantalones did, however, and it was a good thing. Pe Pe learned the Fetch word very quick like.

Juan he love the honey, but no love has Juan for the sting of the bee. Pe Pe, being the wolf child before he come to look like little Juan, did not know the piñata from the beehive. Juan need only say, "Pe Pe knock down the piñata and get the candy" and Juan, he gets the honey and Pe Pe he learns the lesson.

Take it from Juan, raising the child, it is not always the easy thing. Juan, he is thinking this is because of the wolf things. Pe Pe, he does not like the inside bathroom, but seems to like the hole with the big steel  top that Juan has seen near the pasture with many houses. 

When Pe Pe, he acts like he is the wolf child and not the son of Juan, then he will be in the time-out ... not tomorrow ... not when Juan gets home ... he will be in the timeout in the instance and Juan he will not feel sad for Pe Pe until he learns to stand on two feet like the man with no fur and not on four feet like the wolf with fur and a long tail.

My name, if I am not known to you other than by legend alone, is Juan Exagerito, el Lobo Solitario. If you know me tomorrow, I will still be Juan Exagerito, but not el Lobo Solitario. Tomorrow, you will know me as Juan and Pe Pe. Juan and Pe Pe, we look out for each the other. 

Sometimes we, Juan and Pe Pe, hike in the woods and hear the growls of the ferocious animal ... we  find ourselves in the tight squeeze. I say to Pe Pe, "We are in the tight squeeze, let us hide behind the pimple tree for the growls they may be the chupacabra. Pe Pe you stand in front and I will protect you."

Sometimes we hike in the woods and see the fence stepped on by the Sasquatch, and I say to Pe Pe, "Stay right in front of me and when the Sasquatch comes for you, it is me he will find with the stick upon his head from behind."

Sometimes we hike in the woods, and Pe Pe he keeps the eyes open with the Senor Citizen Bifocal Binoculars for the Sasquatch and the chupacabra so safe Juan and Pe Pe will be. 

Pe Pe and Juan, we take the picnic in the woods and we feel safe with each ... our backs we watch for the other. 

If you find the wolf child, we, Juan and Pe Pe, say here's to you if you take him home. Even wolf childs need a home.

If you ask Pe Pe, he will say "Si, it is hard work to be the wolf child and now little Juan". If you ask Juan, he will say "Si, it is hard to be the two Juan's for everyone knows two is alway more than Juan."

For Pe Pe, it is hard

For Juan, it is tiring

For Juan and Pe Pe, it is hot

Maybe after a little siesta

It will all make sense.

Buenas Noches