Thoughts on Georgia from Tennessee

I am currently writing from Chattanooga, Tennessee, where they like excess letters. For the last week my youngest brother, Jason, and I have been crisscrossing back and forth across Georgia, setting up curriculum material for a textbook bid that Classical Academic Press (the company at which my brother interns) is pitching to the Georgia public school system.

You might remember that in my travel writing piece I speak about how it is impossible to actually know a place if you simply pass through it. Living in Italy for four months after visiting for two weeks before has shown me this, poignantly. I do not deny, however, that one can form ideas and opinions about a place even from just a flash by the window, ideas and opinions that have truth. It may not be truth about the actual place…but that’s a tangled mess of reasoning that I will let you figure out.

It is with this in mind that I am writing some of my own thoughts about the place that has been Georgia to me. It is such an extreme shift from Italy; I lived there in one place for four months, while for one week I have been moving all over the state, seeing most areas at 65 mph, never staying in one place for more than 12 hours. Orvieto had time to grow and fill out in my mind, while my understanding of Georgia is thin and flat, and scattered. Orvieto is as grounded and contextualized as the tufa cliff on which it sits, while Georgia is untethered, free to drift off, out of mind.

It’s certainly an experience, driving across it. Multiple times. Some places have been pretty amazing looking, actually, like the Currier and Ives looking farmhouse we passed today, or some of the plantations we see from the road. There is a sort of nostalgic aesthetic to rural or agricultural America that I’ve missed out on for the past four months. And while the accents still grate on my ears, the people have for the most part been very friendly.

After a lovely stop in Richmond to have lunch with Erin McRae and her hospitable family, Jason and I took another break in our drive down at South of the Border in South Carolina. Culture shock. After growing somewhat accustomed to an environment in which materials have meaning and significance and are used in a very conscious way, this display was a disgusting waste. Billboards starting 103 miles away proclaimed this polymer-coated shrine to the cheap and transitory. I hope no one ever takes it seriously. It is sad to me that a place could have so little that is real about it.

The first (American) fast food that I’ve had since leaving for Italy entered my body Sunday evening. It apparently wreaked havoc, because I felt like shite the next morning. Thankfully, Subway seems to be a safe alternative. We walked into a Walmart superstore at one point, and it was overwhelming for me. I was reminded once more of the excess when we ate lunch at a Chinese restaurant two days ago. The amount of pork lo mein on my plate was astounding; I barely made a dent in it, and both Jason and I had enough left over for dinner that night. I am serious when I say that a ten-inch diameter plate had a five-inch high pile of food on it. Why?

This carried through to our pizza experience here. First of all, don’t trust any Georgian’s opinion of good pizza. It is wrong. They just don’t know! Our pizza was equally excessive, and not that great tasting. There is so much sugar or salt in everything.

It is interesting to me that this comfort with glut is so prevalent in a place with so much poverty. Excess and superfluity are the last things that most of these people should have, let alone want. We drove through some areas where the town was an intersection with stained trailers grouped around, while an abandoned freight train rusted on the track nearby. Other towns had clean brick laid all around, while manicured gardens and carefully spaced trees lined the double streets. Sometimes these sorts of places were right next to each other. Half of the schools we visited were enormous, clean, and had every facility imaginable. The other half were broken down and had the air of depression around them. One was located in the middle of a neighborhood in which some blocks looked like they were lifted right out of Liberia—huts, dirt paths, dogs, sweating shirtless people.

Another thing you can’t help but notice down here is the profusion of churches. Mostly Baptist, of course, but also Methodist and Church of God. Each small town has to have 3 or 4, it seems, ranging from one room whitewashed buildings with a steeple plunked on top to megachurches. I’ve seen two Presbyterian churches and one Catholic church. In Italy, the numbers were completely opposite. Christianity feels completely different here; we haven’t visited any churches so it may not be entirely fair to make this claim (but remember, this is my Georgia), but in large part it seems to be the type of Christianity I’m working to get away from. There are the obvious aspects of evangelicalism that I don’t think I need to reiterate, but something in particular that seems foreign to me is the strong tie of faith in Christ to faith in America. It is not uncommon to see a church’s sign read “This Sunday a.m.: Patriotic Service,” or to see a billboard with “Jesus Saves: Vote” painted on.

Crazy rims are hugely popular here, even on the crappiest cars. What’s the crappiest car you can think of? Someone in Georgia has it, with dubs. Someone also has a nice, perfectly normal (banal?) car with them, like a Honda Accord. Like, say, the one we saw parked outside of Walmart.

Speaking of cars, the roads around Atlanta are awful. And stopping for gas around there means broken pumps and annoying, ugly hookers. But many of the highways cutting through rural areas are quite nice, flat and wide with a high speed limit, lined on either side by wild forest 150 feet tall and as thick and straight as a hedge. There is something very peaceful about humming along down an open highway in early evening. Until an enormous SUV riding jacked up over monster truck tires bears down on your tail.

In spite of all of this (Georgia), Jason and I have managed to have a decent time. I would have liked to see Savannah because I hear that it might have changed my impressions, but maybe I can stop there some other time. It will be lovely to be back home, though. Once again I find myself saying this.

Perfectus vero cui mundus totus exsilium est.