Wednesday, February 01, 2006
Shanghaied
And what a weekend it was. Let me first get one thing out of the way: our provincial, parochial, commie-Jew, microbrew-sipping, quiche-eating, Merrell-wearing, Hamptons-summering Yankee snob conceptions were challenged...well, not one iota. This sign, in western Maryland, certainly saw to that: 
We spent Thursday and Friday nights embraced in the bosom of Philadelphia, which really is a cute city, minus the casual violence, and struck out for Harper's Ferry Saturday morning. We passed by Baltimore (which we would do no less than three times in two days), through Maryland (the guns 'n' roses store; they really had them right next to each other: "Hmm, I'll take a plate of fried chicken, a coconut pie, a large root beer, a birthday card for Grandma, and why don't you lemme get one of them twelve-gauges up on the wall there. Yeah, two boxes of cartridges, too. Aw, hell, and throw in some flowers for the wife while I'm at it."), slipped through Virginia unnoticed and crossed the Shenandoah into West Virginia.
First impressions of West Virginia: "What the fuck? What are all these McMansions and Thai restaurants doing here?" It turns out state-line WVA is fairly posh. To say nothing of beautifully warm, 62�. But happily, penetrate a few dozen miles into it, and the roads stop being maintained, or even graded, and the car starts getting big air over the rises. The big suburban home of the riverfronts become aluminium-sideds pre-fab shacks, with rusted pickups in the front yard. The earth seems more cracked and stern, almost ashen, the trees are deathly and withered, and suddenly the only suitable music is "Dueling Banjos." This is coal mining country, and we are here out of sheer, perverse, reprehensible morbidity. We re-enact the battle of Antietam on the battlefield itself, where one realizes the starkest truth of what makes a battlefield: there is nowhere to hide. We are looking for Harbin, for Hohhot, for Panzihua, for Guangxi and Fujian provinces. Harper's Ferry, however, is none of these. Harper's Ferry is nothing but a tourist trap, like Hannibal, Missouri, birthplace of Mark Twain. At Molly the Rebel Shop, Liz buys a confederate hat for her friend Molly, though what she had really needed was a shirt bearing the legend, Molly the Rebel, and we soon clear out, looking for something more. But spirits in the front seats brighten soon, as Andrew and I consult our map, on which we find precisely what we have been looking for. It is uncannily, eerily perfect. We set a course, which is difficult as most of the roads we will be using are not marked, per se, and neither is the town. It takes a while, and, in fact, we drive through it once, missing it altogether. But at last, we see the sign--the only indication that we have, at last, reached the China of the United States:
It is a town with a general store, nothing more. A single crossroads in the middle of blighted countryside. It was exactly what we were looking for.
The day's excitement had tired us, and we did not linger late Saturday evening. The next morning we rose, ate a banal breakfast of bibimbap, and bade Comrade Blue goodbye. It had been an excellently successful weekend. I went to meet my cousin Seth, and we camped out at a cafe and caught up while Andrew took Isaac, who had to get back to New York, to the bus station. Andrew returned, and after making our farewells, hit the road one more time. This time for Washington, D.C., there to gorge myself on delusional West Wing fantasies.
Because DC is not, to me, where real people live. In my head, it's the set of my favorite show. I expect to see Josh and Toby striding up the mall. I have always liked DC. It is good, it is meet, that the halls of power should be so grouped together. I am unabashedly inspired by it, because though administrations, foul and fair, turn over time and again, Washington endures. The Smithsonian and the Library of Congress are imperturbable. The Department of Defense will not cease to function, nor will the Department of Justice, because vicious men direct them. Washington reminds me that government is fundamentally a tradition, and not so subject to the volition of the demos as we fear. Work will be done, the water will run, regardless of what the people want. There are smart, good, devoted people in those buildings, there always have been, and there always will be. A trip there will do wonders to alleviate despair.
But then again, so will pictures like this:
We spent Thursday and Friday nights embraced in the bosom of Philadelphia, which really is a cute city, minus the casual violence, and struck out for Harper's Ferry Saturday morning. We passed by Baltimore (which we would do no less than three times in two days), through Maryland (the guns 'n' roses store; they really had them right next to each other: "Hmm, I'll take a plate of fried chicken, a coconut pie, a large root beer, a birthday card for Grandma, and why don't you lemme get one of them twelve-gauges up on the wall there. Yeah, two boxes of cartridges, too. Aw, hell, and throw in some flowers for the wife while I'm at it."), slipped through Virginia unnoticed and crossed the Shenandoah into West Virginia.
First impressions of West Virginia: "What the fuck? What are all these McMansions and Thai restaurants doing here?" It turns out state-line WVA is fairly posh. To say nothing of beautifully warm, 62�. But happily, penetrate a few dozen miles into it, and the roads stop being maintained, or even graded, and the car starts getting big air over the rises. The big suburban home of the riverfronts become aluminium-sideds pre-fab shacks, with rusted pickups in the front yard. The earth seems more cracked and stern, almost ashen, the trees are deathly and withered, and suddenly the only suitable music is "Dueling Banjos." This is coal mining country, and we are here out of sheer, perverse, reprehensible morbidity. We re-enact the battle of Antietam on the battlefield itself, where one realizes the starkest truth of what makes a battlefield: there is nowhere to hide. We are looking for Harbin, for Hohhot, for Panzihua, for Guangxi and Fujian provinces. Harper's Ferry, however, is none of these. Harper's Ferry is nothing but a tourist trap, like Hannibal, Missouri, birthplace of Mark Twain. At Molly the Rebel Shop, Liz buys a confederate hat for her friend Molly, though what she had really needed was a shirt bearing the legend, Molly the Rebel, and we soon clear out, looking for something more. But spirits in the front seats brighten soon, as Andrew and I consult our map, on which we find precisely what we have been looking for. It is uncannily, eerily perfect. We set a course, which is difficult as most of the roads we will be using are not marked, per se, and neither is the town. It takes a while, and, in fact, we drive through it once, missing it altogether. But at last, we see the sign--the only indication that we have, at last, reached the China of the United States:
It is a town with a general store, nothing more. A single crossroads in the middle of blighted countryside. It was exactly what we were looking for.
The day's excitement had tired us, and we did not linger late Saturday evening. The next morning we rose, ate a banal breakfast of bibimbap, and bade Comrade Blue goodbye. It had been an excellently successful weekend. I went to meet my cousin Seth, and we camped out at a cafe and caught up while Andrew took Isaac, who had to get back to New York, to the bus station. Andrew returned, and after making our farewells, hit the road one more time. This time for Washington, D.C., there to gorge myself on delusional West Wing fantasies.
Because DC is not, to me, where real people live. In my head, it's the set of my favorite show. I expect to see Josh and Toby striding up the mall. I have always liked DC. It is good, it is meet, that the halls of power should be so grouped together. I am unabashedly inspired by it, because though administrations, foul and fair, turn over time and again, Washington endures. The Smithsonian and the Library of Congress are imperturbable. The Department of Defense will not cease to function, nor will the Department of Justice, because vicious men direct them. Washington reminds me that government is fundamentally a tradition, and not so subject to the volition of the demos as we fear. Work will be done, the water will run, regardless of what the people want. There are smart, good, devoted people in those buildings, there always have been, and there always will be. A trip there will do wonders to alleviate despair.
But then again, so will pictures like this:
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| Graphic Design Job |
