May 20 to May 26, 2017—Making tracks for home, the gravitational forces becoming stronger the nearer we get
Moundville State Park, Alabama
There are 25 dirt piles in Moundville State Park, the largest about forty feet long by sixty feet wide and sixty feet tall, the lowest barely deserving the label “mound.” They were built over the thousand years preceding the 14th century by the Native American Empire that stretched from Ohio to northern Florida, a loose confederacy known collectively as the “mound-building people.” The state park is alongside the mound village and is imbued with a solemn, mysterious atmosphere; it has the vibe of a city of the dead and an ancient riddle. It was a curious feeling to be one of only a handful of people spending the drizzly night amongst these ancient remains. Before retiring I walked among the mounds in the dark, under an umbrella.
The museum on site had quite a collection of locally-collected artifacts, vessels and large ornamental plates featuring recurring motifs–the open hand with an eye on the palm and the snake tied in knots. These objects were artfully executed, with sure lines and highly polished. One of them, a circular plate of copper two feet in circumference and incised with the hand/eye image, is said to be one of the most significant Native American artifacts in existence. The experts have not come to a definitive answer on the purpose or meaning of the mounds. When we saw similar structure on the Gulf shore of Florida the official speculation was that the inhabitants sought the higher elevation to catch the cooling breeze and escape the miasma and mosquitoes. Seemed a reasonable explanation there and I don’t know why it wouldn’t apply here. The Moundville village also had ponds where fish were cultivated, the excavation of which supplied the mound material. So I can imagine a guy digging a koi pond and using the dirt to build himself a nice little platform like a patio; his neighbor sees that and decides to do the same, except he has to make his higher. And so on. Anyway it was a great destination for us. The informative and well-stocked interpretive center is in a nicely-designed concrete structure built by our old friends The Civilian Conservation Corps in the 1930s.
Chattanooga, TN
“Gone to Chattanoogie, Gone to Chattanoogie, see my ponies run, pretty mama.”
Very much like Pittsburgh in its recent history—a factory town where all the noxious fumes of the economy hovered over the town, trapped by its valley location. When the factories closed the dirty city became depressed, economically and in all other ways. A forward-thinking master plan and state infusions of money turned it into a model of recovery. Chattanooga was one of the first successful river-walk communities (imitated now in cities like Oklahoma City that don’t even have a river), one of the first to offer free public transport in the city center. Now, like Pittsburgh, it is a desirable residential and tourist center, and a medical services hub for the region. An 1890s bridge was turned into a pedestrian walkway and this fostered the growth of the communities across the river.
We stayed outside Chattanooga, at the foot of Lookout Mountain in an RV camp. I stayed up half the night talking to a guy who was an Air Force-trained anesthetist who rotates in an out of military settings. Curious to me is that he is an armed medical specialist and engages in military operations when not doing medical work; I guess I had always thought of medical personnel as being non-combatants. He was a bit of a braggart and a conspiracy-theorist, but his experiences were so far from mine, or any one I know, that I liked hearing his stories. He said he looked forward to the end of his enlistment obligation so he could contract himself out to the military for the same work as a private citizen and make some real money. If I understood him correctly he suggested that he could make over $700,000 for a six month stint in a combat zone.
“As the sun pulls away from the shore, and our boat sinks slowly in the west…”
We stayed our last night in a state park in southern Virginia, about an hour north of Bristol. It was a Thursday night and the park was full as the Memorial Day weekend approached. And apparently it was full of people who knew each other and/or were related to one another. There was a lot of commotion in the tightly-packed camp, with kids running around, sullen teenagers commiserating, and the adults yacking and laughing in small or large groups at this camper or that camper. Lots of accent and lots of bumper stickers affirming a dedication to hunting, NASCAR, the current president, various sports teams.
We made a dash home, crossing the Potomac around 3pm on Friday the 26th, one year and two days after our departure.
We had seen a lot of country in 25,000 miles—gorgeous gorges, beautiful buttes, a mess of mesas. And we met a lot of nice people, some of whom will remain friends. But after all our travels, as Judy Garland said, “Be a darling and make me another martini.”