The Weekend that Was: Part One - Saturday

I have found that there are places in Georgia that are as lovely as any I've ever traveled to and the area around Oxford, Georgia is one of those. I like the rolling piedmont countryside, especially when it's not blighted with housing developments and suburban sprawl. Give me farmland and pastures divided by hardwood forests and homes that exist without supporting arteries of cul-de-sacs and pseudo rustic neighborhood names: The Oaks, Surrey Chase, Cascade Glen. I like to see houses standing solitary and proud in their vast expanse of green, not crowded fearfully together like quail.

I could live here, I thought - few neighbors, lots of greenery, almost no light pollution at night to thwart my star-gazing. There would be issues, of course - long distances to drive simply for basic shopping, questionable schools, only prepackaged American cheese slices available at the local marts . . . and there were those signs in the yards: Romney/Ryan. One of the truisms in American culture is the deeper you get into the countryside, the more smugly conservative the population. I'd be less concerned if I thought the people were delving into the issues and exploring them from a variety of view points, carefully coming to their conclusions - but I know from long experience that's not true. As far as most of these people are concerned, they listen to Sean Hannity who tells them what to think and why and that's good enough.

We had about two hours between soccer games so my wife and youngest son and I jetted off to find something to eat - so that Will could be sodden and heavy with food and unable to play up to his ability in the unseasonable October heat. Not a good plan, perhaps, but it's important to have a plan. We were looking for one of the big sandwich chains because that's what Will wanted to eat. Not me - I can't get behind paying for a sandwich. It's like going out and paying for toast. Here's something I can do pretty well at home . . .

But that's what we were looking for - a sandwich shoppe - and we had to drive a fair distance to find that sort of prefabricated architecture embedded in concrete roads and parking lots where such things dwell. First we had to drive out of Church Country and this took some time. I like best the churches that have marquees out front that advertise their piety through clever messages: God answers knee-mail! No God, no peace - Know God, know peace! It's a marketing technique and a good one. Mostly these are the smaller churches, the ones where you can usually be assured of a good old fashioned fire-and-brimstone sermon about hell, like the ones Jesus used to give. There were quite a few of these on our route, as well as a business with its own marquee telling the President, in no uncertain terms, "God built this business, Mr. Obama." I'm sure that whenever Mr. Obama drives by he'll see that marquee and squish down low in his seat, hiding from shame.

The Georgia countryside is also home to all-of-a-sudden, just when you least expect it, mega-churches: big modern buildings that look as if they could hold a congregation of thousands. Lots of glass and vast parking lots that would not be out of place at a strip mall. These churches usually sport esoteric names that seem more like advertising slogans or catch-phrases: Living Water! Rock of Ages! We passed one on our odyssey that was glassy and modular and boasted its own cafe inside! Just like Jesus planned.

 My wife was driving because on Soccer Saturdays I need to be clear-minded. I told her to stop! Right here! This church with its own cafe was having a BBQ and Jesus knows how much I love BBQ! This was the Loaves and the Fishes all over again, and I was saved from having to get a cold sandwich put together by some surly teen wearing plastic gloves. We whipped right in and I jumped out . . .

The gentlemen of the church were working together in harmony beneath a canopy to create a plate of pork BBQ with chips and drink for $5. The air was savory with the smell of the stuff - really, one of the few items of Southern Cuisine that I find not only palatable but also delicious. Being raised by an Italian mother has made me a tedious foody snob - but I'm a shameless BBQ epicure and this was just the kind I liked: cooked out-of-doors and prepared right there for you. Ideally it should be messy, sauce hemorrhaging from the sides, and piquant.

I walked up to the canopy with my five dollar bill in hand and asked for my BBQ prepared to order, to wit: laid open face over the buns and eaten with a fork. The fifty-something white guy at the smoker called out, "This man knows his BBQ!" and I smiled at the compliment, mainly because it's true. Another fifty-something white gentleman, standing behind one of the folding tables that separated customers from BBQ dealers, crinkled his eyes at me and leaned forward.

"Tell me, friend - do you have a church family?" My stomach lurched in a familiar way.

Yes, yes I do.

He nodded and radiated contentment. "Where do you go, friend?"

I told him.

He leaned even closer forward so that I could see the outsized pores on his nose and the way his teeth seem shellacked by tobacco or coffee or both. "And when did you realize you needed Jesus in your life?"

I wanted to say, "Right now, sir. Your BBQ did it. What did you put in the sauce?"

This is one of my biggest personal pitfalls in my attempt to adjust to live in The South, even after nearly thirty years of being Out of New England. I have never felt comfortable with people talking Jesus to me. The culture in which I grew up valued religion but saw it as something you keep to yourself, perhaps as a result of greater diversity for a longer period of time. We were Jews and Catholics and Unitarians. You knew if someone was a spiritual person based on their behavior, not from their constant protestations of religiosity. Deeds not words. Where I grew up people saw religion as something intimate and personal - like sex. I'm no more comfortable having someone Witness Unto Me than I am having some guy come up and say to me, "My wife and I really had some great sex last night!" I mean, it's great that you do it and you have every right under the law - both spiritual and temporal - but it embarrasses me to hear you talk about it. That's personal business and I prefer to be kept unaware.

All I wanted at this point was to buy a BBQ pork plate with chips and my choice of a drink but I couldn't get away from this guy who wanted to engage me spiritually.

"When did you realize you needed Jesus in your life?" I tried gently to disengage, feeling the rush of aggressiveness that seems to wash over me when I feel that someone is stepping over a cultural boundary into the Land of Taboo. I had a variety of responses, all of them smart-ass, but I kept them in check.

I mean, I wouldn't feel comfortable asking anyone about their religious habits, any more than I would ask about your sex life, or how often you floss, or whether you take your daily BM first thing in the morning or closer to lunch.

I told the guy that it was probably when I had kids, watching anxiously while a different guy wrapped my BBQ, sweating bullets and willing him to hurry along.

"Friend, me too!" And now we were linked indelibly by this connections. I feared more to come and was already back pedalling, trying to get into my car. Sorry, friend! Liberal Yankee here - I don't talk about religion in parking lots, not even church parking lots! Just wanted BBQ! Forgive me for I am a sinner!

"This is all for the kids," he told me, spreading his arms like unto Christ on the Cross.

Yes sir, I nodded.

"Do you need your car washed?"

No sir.

I got back into the truck and told me wife to drive, for the love of all that's holy! Drive, woman!

The BBQ was pretty good, though. It wasn't the best but at that point I was no longer qualified to judge . . .

The Best Part of My Day . . .

There is a certain amount of responsibility that comes with riding a motorcycle and, no, I don’t mean simply wearing a helmet and being hyper-aware at intersections. It goes deeper than that – or perhaps it goes wider, I’m not sure of the steps one takes in these philosophical waltzes . . .

The best part of my day comes at its working end, when I pull out of the parking lot of my own school and ride to my youngest son’s elementary school to pick him up and take him home. Whatever may have happened previous to that moment blows away in the wind as I ride away.

Consider the scene as I pull up to the elementary school: long lines of children pouring relentlessly out the doors while teachers and school staff ride herd on them, moving them along, guiding them to the proper buses. I roll along in the opposite direction of mothers in cars, giving me free rein to rumble my engines and cruise down the lane, hooking left into the forbidden parking lot where I have an assured parking spot in front of the dumpsters because motorcycles can, essentially, make their own parking spot.

I am a man who currently stands within rock-throwing distance of hitting fifty years old. My last fist fight was decades ago, right about the time I was sexually viable to the opposite sex, but none of that matters if you arrive somewhere on the motorcycle. People look at your differently. Black guys – the touchstone of male star power in this culture – give you the quick nod of recognition when you pull up somewhere and idle, even with your helmet off and your thin hair pressed to your skull from the contours of the helmet itself.

When children see you pull up in that fashion they put on the brakes and sag backwards, away from the hand of the adult who is moving them along. They look at you the way they would a robot or a professional athlete or an alien. Their eyes become large and their feet slow down.

This is where you owe them something – perhaps a quick couple of bursts of throttle while you’re idling so your engine roars. Maybe you haven’t parked yet – it’s your responsibility to make a wide, low-leaning half circle into your parking spot. Now you can throttle a couple of times, as if that’s absolutely necessary before parking. Pull your helmet off, run your free hand through your hair, and adjust your sunglasses – all done while still in the saddle. Finally, you make eye contact with the child, who is still reluctantly walking away, pulling back against the adult’s hand so he can take in this spectacle of an Olympian come down to earth. You give him a curt but friendly nod and he gets a hitch to his step and suddenly trots up to the hip of his adult handler, pointing back at you and sharing the news of your glory . . .

Generally I get to the school before the buses have all loaded and the kids have gotten used to seeing me standing out front, waiting for the flood of kids to abate so I can walk indoors. You can’t fight your way upstream against that tide. One time I made the mistake of sitting on one of the park benches beneath the portico. A tiny Hmong child no bigger than a hand puppet stood in front of me and gave me the eye. “I sit there,” he said. I apologized profusely and stood up and he took my place, his backpack between his dangling feet, his expression completely elsewhere.

Some of these kids know me through soccer and I give them a high-five as they troop past to their assigned buses, all of which are named after animals – an innovation this year. In the past kids had to remember their bus route numbers, all of which were complex and difficult.

Many kids don’t know me at all except as that guy who rides up on a motorcycle – or maybe they don’t even know that about me. It doesn’t matter – there is something in the sweetness of a child’s soul that tells them they should wave at me and smile, and they do. It always catches me off guard, but it affects me nonetheless.

My wife works at this school and there’s one particular young lady who is, herself, within rock-throwing distance of becoming a young lady. She’s a year or two away from wearing makeup but she already carries a purse as a necessity and not an affectation. She always gives me a knowing smile and then chides me: “You’re late! Your wife is waiting for you . . .”

And suddenly, just like that, the tide runs out and the halls are empty, or mostly empty and I can make my way down towards my wife’s classroom where my youngest son waits for me in his mother’s classroom

Now the protocol is reversed. When Will and I come out to the bike, if there are kids lingering around, or waiting for their buses to pull out, it is imperative that I throw my leg over the low saddle of the bike and pull my helmet on like a warrior suiting up for battle. The bike is cranked and I rev that engine vigorously, for effect. When Will and I are helmeted and ready, we have become transformed from mortals to riders, our faces and humanity obscured by helmets and tinted shades. Now I pull out slowly but implacably and reverse my half-circle as I navigate through the spaces between the idling buses. You can see the kids pressing their faces to the windows and waving – the ones who know Will call out his name and point and Will, well practiced at this, gives a lazy celebrity’s wave in response (though he’s aware of the impact he makes – often he wants me to take routes that are directly observable by his peers).

There’s no one to see us any more as we ride down the country lanes that circumvent school bus and mom-van traffic, but the vibe is different now. Now that you’re out of the range of diesel smoke from the buses you can smell the sweetness of the country air, that spice of autumn that rides the currents like something imported from some exotic locale. Farmland rolls away to either side, as lovely as anything I’ve seen anywhere in any country I’ve travelled to: rich and green and crisp in the October light, with livestock moving at livestock speed to graze. When your foodstuff can’t run away and lies in abundance as far as your eye can see, your concept of speed and time must be altered.

We wind around and past the farms with their cattle and goats and – in one case – herds of llamas. The trees are gorgeous with autumn colors and the air feels cleaner than that thick and muggy stuff we struggle with during Southern summers, when riding is less pleasant. Now the air carries hints of woodsmoke incense. We rumble past old homes set off the road and obscured by trees and we speculate about the abandoned homes that are slowly but relentlessly being devoured by the jungle.

There is one house in particular that we love to ride past – this one is on a narrow lane that goes through intown neighborhoods, not far from our own intown home. The architecture is typical Small Town Suburban but the garden off to the side boasts strange, exotic plants, arranged in a way that tells the careful observer that these are immigrants from a strange land and, indeed, as Will and I slow down to rumble past we usually see them on a warm afternoon dozing on a platform they have built next to their house, covered from the sun by a roof, their shoes lined up neatly in front. They may live and pay taxes in this small Southern town but they dwell far away, on the side of some mountain in Southeast Asia and when they recline on their sleeping platform they must dream of that faroff homeland . . .