Start: Memphis, Tennessee
End: Clarksdale, Mississippi
States: Tennessee, Mississippi
Continental breakfasts can be hazardous to your health. If you don't believe me just follow the trail of maple syrup I left from the lobby to room 208 in the Comfort Inn while attempting to being Alyssa a waffle (which I got yelled at while making, I ran away while the attendant was taking out the trash). After that issue I opted for a pastry called a Raisin-ette made by a brother-cousin company of Skarsgard's family, Svenhard. You work hard, you play hard, you Svenhard.
Memphis was a full day, even though we weren't actually walking in Memphis. The two attractions on the roster were the National Civil Rights Museum at the Lorraine Hotel and of course, Graceland. We had also intended to go to Beale Street and get an inkling of the blues and barbeque scene, however considering the air was like a wet wall of misery we opted to stay in the air conditioned car as much as possible.
The National Civil Rights Museum I had somewhat mixed emotions about. It is quite an endeavor, with the hotel where Martin Luther King, Jr. was shot being preserved like a time capsule. The film they show, The Witness, featuring Samuel "Billy" Kyles , the remaining minister from that day (Ralph Abernathy, the third died of a blood clot in 1990) was well done and just poignant enough. The exhibits though I found to be somewhat of a letdown. Now I love museums, no matter how dusty or boring. The problem with the informational exhibits in the NCRM was that they bombarded you with information, which I suppose was supposed to be thoughtfully and artistically organized but was really just jumbled together by topic. It took you from abolition through modern day but featured so much text and photographic evidence it gave me a headache.
Two things that I have to commend were the preserved rooms that Dr. King spent his last days and the view of the balcony where he was shot. The simplicity and timelessness of them were far more moving than the overload of information prior to it. The other was the recreation of the bus that Rosa Parks was arrested on. We shared our tour with the Ivory family reunion, a group of almost fifty wearing matching kelly green hats and tee shirts, all African American. When Alyssa and I boarded the bus there were perhaps fifteen Ivory family members of all ages already on it alongside a statue of Rosa Parks refusing to move. Now if you sit too close to her you get a recording of what the bus driver said to her, mainly yelling to move. They all started to tell the two young kids they wouldn't have been welcome to keep sitting where they were. Then it occurred to me, we were the only two Caucasians on the bus. We weren't the ones being yelled at. We sat right behind the driver, but we were white so not one would have looked twice at us. You could tell all the Ivory family members were thinking the same thing. I cannot remember when I have felt more uncomfortable with my own race, or even just sitting some where. Then I felt guilty, because suddenly I realized exactly what segregation was like every day. Powerful stuff indeed. Graceland was not at all what I expected. Now I enjoy Elvis, at my last teaching job the janitor and I bonded over the fact that we both listened to Elvis only on Oldies 103.3 every Sunday morning before church (8 AM-9AM). I like him and think the whole story of his life and fame is interesting, heard the Paul Simon song, heard the Marc Cohn song but had no real passion it seems. Let me tell you this, people are hardcore. It wasn't cheap, but then it seems pilgrimages never are. People there would pay their last penny to see where the King trod. The tour struck me as a little sparse with an audio tour that left a lot to be desired and a tendency to herd visitors like cattle. It could have been done with more class and less rush, but then again given the volume I can see why they cut corners. What fascinated me more than anything is the continued devotion. I mean Elvis has been dead for thirty three years and still people send weekly floral tributes from around the world. The people there all had tee shirts with his face on it, not to mention more permanent tattoos of his person and signature. I have reason to believe we all will be received in Graceland. P.S. fun fact, (well perhaps not fun per-say) did you know that Elvis had a twin brother, Jesse, who died at birth? Learn something new every day.
After Graceland we hit the low point of our trip, driving around south Memphis looking for a barbeque place to eat. There was just nothing, not even chain restaurants. Everything was closed or boarded up, or looked far too dangerous to go in as two girls alone. Coming from the tightly populated New England where there is always something it was a shock. It reminded me of the former Communist nations I saw in Eastern Europe more than a major American city. The frustration we felt was to be expected, and was nothing compared with the road to Clarksdale.
Once you leave Tennessee behind there is nothing to see, even the farms are short and squat. A two lane road that barely even encounters town runs south into Mississippi. We saw crop dusting, burning of fields, and a tractor trailer truck that blew a tire side by side with a ten mile strip of enormous brand name casinos. Not quite sure what to make of it. Clarksdale is small and overall very poor. A woman from Mississippi spoke to us this morning at the museum and said of her home state, "we're forty-ninth in everything, except for obesity, which we're number one." The South continues to reveal sad secrets like this, and while our first night in Clarksdale was spent with another of Alyssa's college friends at her lovely home and out to dinner at the Stone Pony for pizza and Madidi (Morgan Freeman's bar) for drinks, underneath is an air of poverty and life on the edge that still bears exploring, because we are after all very far from home, and our own comfort level.