Skip to main content

#Scattered_Day 2


552 miles from Bremen, Georgia to Shreveport, Louisiana

I had a difficult time conjuring Della, Tish, or Ann on todays ride. First of all, I despise the kind of Super Slab Ground Pounding style of riding I've been doing for the last two days. It's all because I made reservations in Sedona! Something I never do just for this reason. So as of tomorrow morning, that's gonna stop. I'll get to Sedona when I get to Sedona. And if my hosts' psyche skills are legit, she will already know that, right!? 

Frankly, I wanted to quit today. I'll admit it. And if you read my book 'Riding Soul-O,' you know I'm okay with 'honoring my limitations.' After calling the 4 key people in my life (my go-to people) and having this discussion their collective advice was basically 'you are tired, you need to get something to eat, a good nights sleep and make your decision in the morning.'  I'm not a quitter. But I will 'Adapt, Improvise, and Overcome.'

I've traveled the deep south for the last two days - I've LIVED in the deep south for the last 40 years but Florida doesn't really count as DEEP SOUTH - and here is what occupied my mind as I clicked off the miles. The Confederate flag. The flag flies everywhere down here; twice today I saw the Confederate flag flying ABOVE the U.S. flag on a flag pole. One was even flying (below) along with the U.S. flag at the Mississippi National Guard Armory.

I don't intend to make this blog political but it IS my blog and it IS about the topics that set my brain on fire.

I visited Appomattox Court House a few years ago and walked the same path that General Lee walked on his way to surrender to General Grant which ended the Civil War. Period. The flag was representative of the Confederate states; they don't exist. The flag has since become a symbol of hate, division, racism, bigotry and violence. A symbol of the Klan and white supremacists. It is a symbol of oppression that needs to be laid to rest. Enough about politics.

I crossed the Mississippi River again today and the sight of its muddy waters never ceases to amaze me. I've crossed it in every state it runs through on various travels. The Mississippi River carries a vast amount of our country's history along in its current. The music, the literature, the food and of course the river's role in the Civil War. I guess I thought a great deal about history today. I am a huge blues fan; traveled all through Mississippi on the Blues Trail. When I taught 9th grade I used the entire PBS series 'The History of the Blues' to engage reluctant readers! The kids loved it; we spent an entire semester learning about the blues. I've stood at the crossroads of Rt. 61 and 49 where legend has it  Robert Johnson sold his soul to the Devil for guitar greatness. Promised myself on the return trip home, I would hit the Blues Trail again.

I'm hoping tomorrow my character Della will decide to ride with me; history can weigh heavy on my mind, especially when I see it being repeated.


Debi Tolbert Duggar is the author of 'Riding Soul-O'
Part Memoir, Part Travelogue, Part Spiritual Salvation
Available at Bessieandme.com and online wherever books are sold




Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Waning Light

  There are times I dread the waning light of day, That golden hour which precedes the night. The night brings sad memories. The night brings old terrors. The night brings lonely hours, Sleepless hours, Blackness filled with sorrow. The darkness carries the quiet, the quiet commands the truth. The night accentuates my aloneness; it echoes my fears. The darkness makes me yearn for my children and for my loved ones long gone. The night plays a melancholy tune in my head. The night makes me yearn for the light of day when everything is new once again.                                                                                                     ~ Author: Debi Tolbert Duggar   As a...
Post a Comment
Read more

#Scattered_TheBox

     Bree sat silent in the passenger seat of Della’s Range Rover as they drove away from the city towards Bree’s farmhouse. Della respected her friends silence, glancing furtively towards Bree, checking for what? Della didn’t know; was there a protocol for ‘how to act when your friend is told she has a few months to live?’ Della wasn’t sure and at this moment her heart hurt as if it were being squeezed by a giant hand intent on crushing the organ in her chest.       Della met Bree Maxwell at the registrar’s office in 1974 at the University of Chicago. Just two long-haired hippie chicks in bell bottom denims and crop tops among thousands, struggling to look cool while simultaneously overwhelmed by the process of registering for classes. The two became fast friends and shortly thereafter they met Tish and Ann, also freshman. The foursome became inseparable and forged a bond that has endured four decades.         Bree is the...
Post a Comment
Read more

Summer Road Trip_The Warehousians

June 16, 2012 In the summer of 1969, when everyone old enough and hip enough was flocking to Yasgar's Farm in upstate New York for a music festival called Woodstock, I and most of my friends were looking forward to starting high school. The tidal wave of rock n roll, free love, tye-dye, psychedelics, and peace was just beginning to roll across the country from the west coast; it would find willing participants in the sleepy little mid-western town I grew up in. It was music that brought us together in the early '70's at a seemingly abandoned building in downtown Marion Indiana (righteously name The 7th Street Warehouse), and it was music that brought us together Saturday night in a building once occupied by Freel and Mason drugstore in downtown Marion some 40 years later for a first attempt at a 'reunion' of sorts. Our 'Prophet,' Duke, started a Facebook Page about a year ago, called the '7th Street Warehouse People,' which mushroomed (no pun intend...
Post a Comment
Read more