The Team WestEnders Atlanta odyssey continued on Saturday with an excursion to nearby Stone Mountain. We’d read in some tourism brochure that it was a landmark you could hike to the top of, to gain a sweeping view of the city and surrounding area. Well, lemme tell ya, that’s the fancy-words propaganda version…what they actually MEANT to say was “it’s a big-ass hunk o’granite that you can plow your way straight up…and if you make it, you might be rewarded with a lovely vista, blah blah blah”. (I should totally write their material, yeah?)
So we started marching up the side of this thing, along with the multitudes of other visitors from toddler age to senior citizens (some of whom were NOT dressed for strenuous outdoor activity, I’m just sayin’. Yeah, Ms. flip-flops, sparkly tank top, and skinny jeans, I’m talking to you…). After a sweaty, heart-pounding trek, we reached the summit…where most of the promised scenic landscape was obscured by the muggy haze blanketing our little corner of Georgia that day. Oh well, it was worth a shot…
However, there was one more…ahem..."feature"…we had to find. You see, Derek had heard in one of his history classes that Stone Mountain was called (brace yourself) “the Confederate Mt. Rushmore”, and he was dying to discover why it had earned this moniker. We figured it was probably just a plaque somewhere, or a flag, or something (hopefully) subtle. Ohhh, it wasn’t. When we found the massive carving on the other side of the rock, our collective jaws hit the ground in shock…and horror. Yep, that would be Jefferson Davis, Robert E. Lee, and Andrew Jackson, MUCH larger than life, and preserved for all eternity. Just…I can't even...y’all.
It was all we could do not to turn our Yankee selves around and run screaming, but being us, of course we had to process our thoughts and discuss it a little bit first. Here’s a summary of what we came up with:
Me: That’s…infuriatingly offensive.
Riley: (couldn’t even express his distaste, but only managed to shake his head ruefully)
Husband: It’s….a travesty.
Derek: (interjecting brightly into his family's collective somber demeanor, with a wickedly mischievous grin) Heeeyyyy...can I buy a t-shirt? (Which naturally lightened the mood considerably-- even while earning him a well-deserved smack.)
Ohhh-kaaay….moving right along: on Sunday we planned to venture to the town of Athens, sort of on our way home, to explore the University of Georgia while we were “in the neighborhood”. I must say, there were some conflicted thoughts going into this, though—such as the fact that the University of South Carolina and UGA are fierce sports rivals. You didn't know that? You clearly haven't had the...benefit...of Derek mentioning “Week 2 of the football season” in conversation at every possible opportunity (when the teams will...I don't know...enact their gridiron clash of the titans…or whatever).
Anyway, this is excuse Derek gave for why he would not, under any circumstances, be photographed during our outing—and he proceeded to duck comically behind bushes, and dart erratically out of the frame, every time I took out my camera. However....never one to back down from a challenge, I managed to get a sneaky shot while his back was turned and he wasn’t expecting it. His reaction was priceless: supreme indignation, throwing up his hands and shouting, “Jeez, Mom, you had ONE job!” Then for the next 20 minutes or so (which was as long as he could sustain his faux outrage), he enacted his revenge, refusing to speak directly to me, and instead asking Riley to convey his responses to my comments…even though I was right behind him, and could hear him perfectly. (Riley of course thought this was hysterical, and played right along. Overgrown brats…)
Aaannnd then there was Riley’s issue…he had been so taken with Georgia Tech that he'd purchased a souvenir in the bookstore…a banner that simply proclaims THWG. Don’t worry, I had to ask what it meant, too: in short, To Hell With…Georgia. (And yes, after a little bit of parental consideration I allowed him to get it, having deemed it amusing…and only mildly inappropriate…)
So Riley was honestly hoping NOT to like this campus as much as Tech, to avoid any potential crises in the (not-so-distant) future when he begins seriously thinking about where he might want to attend college. (And can we just pause one moment for the obligatory Mom Freak Out: Ack! Didn’t we JUST do this? It can’t be time to go down this road again already, right? Okay, I’m better now….)
In all fairness to UGA, though, the grounds are gorgeous, boasting towering, stately old trees and ornate, classical architecture.
Hmm…about that…it occurred to me as we strolled through the quads and around the buildings that the whole thing gave off kind of a…plantation air. The commemorative sign that described how the school had closed during one period…so students and professors could support the…"War for Southern Independence”…did nothing to dispel this impression. (And once again—ay yi yi with the Confederate spin on history. I find it very disconcerting….)
Anyway, it turned out not to matter all that much, since Riley declared very shortly into our tour that he wouldn’t want to spend 4 years there. To summarize, he asserted that he preferred the smaller, centrally-organized Georgia Tech, with its proximity to Atlanta, over the sprawling, enormous Georgia, set in a small town.
Or, as Derek phrased it in his own unique way: “So, you’re looking at the ACC, rather than the SEC—and forget about the Big Ten schools, you’d hate them!” (Siiiighhhh…leave it to my sports fanatic son to reduce the complex, deeply personal college search to…an ESPN sound bite!) Alrighty, then—Riley was also pleased that this comparative exercise helped him to crystallize what he does and doesn’t want from his potential institution of higher learning. Mission (that we didn’t even know we were attempting) accomplished!
And with that, our Georgian ramble of 2018 was finished. We took our drippy selves (goodness gracious, it’s HOOOOTTT in the South…in June…) back to the car to navigate 350-ish miles northeast (and well out of Dixie). Thanks for the new memories, Atlanta--our experience was certainly…all kinds of educational!
No comments:
Post a Comment