A Chat with Myself on the Beach

Yesterday morning I had a brief chat with myself on the beach, spurred by this statue that I saw:



As is usually the case when I'm not in a hurry and come across a piece of art, I began to walk around it, snapping pictures, while I tried to decide what the best angle and lighting would be.

Oh, that's interesting. Let me get a little closer.



He doesn't have any shorts on. Is he naked?

No, he's not naked. You've seen like 500 surfers in the past three days. They wear wetsuits. He's wearing a wetsuit.

Oh, yeah, that makes sense.



That's a nipple. Why does his wetsuit have nipples?

Are you sure? Oh, wait, yeah, that's totally a nipple.

Maybe it's like in that Batman movie? The one where the Batsuit had nipples?

Jesus, that movie was awful.

Yeah. Hey, wait...



I can see his junk.

Yeah, that's not a wetsuit. He's naked.

...

Better get a photo.

I lift my lamp beside the... gas station door?: Part 1 of my trip home

Remember when I went to Bizarro Philly and mentioned that there's really nothing all that special about my hometown of Philadelphia, NY? All that has changed, and my town now has something of note.

I'm not talking about the historic one-room schoolhouse:



which they've sold off and had moved away since the last time I was home, or even the stretch limo up on blocks by the high school:



now in its second year of gracing the side of the road on Route 11. No, I'm talking about a semi-permanent monument, a symbol, the kind of thing that might pull some tourists off of the highway and show them that our town cares enough about our country to erect a statue in between the Stewart's Convenience Store, about which I have nothing but good things to say, and Philly Fuels, for which I have nothing but scorn.

I give you the Philadelphia, NY, Statue of Liberty and flagpole:



Let the kind of patriotism that only a ten foot replica statue of another, better monument somewhere else can provide wash over you for a moment, and then I'll take a moment to explain my simultaneous love and hate.

Why I love it: Oh, God, it's tacky. I love tacky roadside monuments like a pig loves rolling in mud.

Why I hate it: The Statue of Liberty celebrates America's welcoming and acceptance of immigrants from all over the world. My town, on the other hand, is pretty unwelcoming toward outsiders. When I was in high school the military base near the village was expanding, bringing in lots more kids to the school district. I was one of them, and for pretty much the entire time I was there the local chatter was all about "outsiders" and "transient military people" and "those people", and that's not even getting into the variety of racist terms that were bandied about since the high school stopped being all-white.

Not only that, but it stands in the village of Philadelphia, where summer jobs are only available to people who are related to other people who live in the village (a fact that was confirmed for me by my friend, the mayor's daughter), and it was purchased by and erected on the property of Philly Fuels, a business whose proprietor told me in the summer of 1994 that they only hire females to work in the store, because "Boys are too much trouble, and the trucks like to see girls behind the counter."

The idea that my village, home of the high school that willingly purchased alumni directory software that did not allow LGBT people to list a partner, rather than spouse, before gay marriage was legal in New York and then wouldn't ask the provider to change it, is suddenly welcoming to the tired, the poor, the huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the homeless, and the tempest-tossed strikes me as ridiculous, especially since the anti-Jewish graffiti that I noticed on village property in 2008:



still hasn't been cleaned off as of last week:



I suppose it's possible that some of the things I mentioned have changed since I was in high school and college and that my village is now a whole other place, but I seriously doubt it. Instead, I bet that from the outsider's perspective it's still pretty unwelcoming.

You probably wouldn't notice, though, if you only stopped long enough to get some gas and stare at our new statue.

The Severed Head of Victor Ashe

For as much as I talk about art and how much I believe in it and how evil the city art task force is, I do have to say that some art just isn't for everybody.

For example, I think the sculpture in the middle of the pedestrian walkway on campus is ugly:



I'm not alone. The students protested loudly when it was installed, and the school eventually had to install security cameras due to damage done by vandals. They don't have cameras for the fish with legs:



or the Torchbearer:



or the naked girl riding a bull that I don't seem to have a photograph of, but they have them to watch that fugly pile of aluminum and plastic. And yes, I realize that there is technique and symbolism and all sorts of hard work and careful thought that went into that sculpture, but no amount of education or art appreciation will make me think that thing doesn't look like the sad playground at a run-down McDonald's.

Anyway, the whole reason I was thinking about ugly art, or, more charitably, art gone wrong, was the sculpture that I saw this weekend at Victor Ashe Park. Elizabeth and I met Kay there very early on Saturday morning to volunteer for the Great Strides Walk to end cystic fibrosis. We had a lot of fun handing out t-shirts all morning, and everyone else seemed to enjoy it, too.

They had face painting, a clown making balloon animals:



food and drinks:



a silent auction:



and the whole thing was presided over by a creepy severed bronze head on a pike.

Yeah, you heard me.

This has to be the most horribly misguided memorial sculpture I've ever seen:



unless Victor Ashe had some sort of skin condition, or decapitation problem, or tragic skull crushing accident:



in which case I will apologize profusely.

As it is, though, I think that thing is creepy and weird and kind of unattractive.

Marble and Bronze

Today turned out to be pretty educational for me, even though my original goal was just to get out of the house for a while after I spent almost all of my vacation helping fight the Sun Eater with my colleagues.

The first stop on my list was Ijam's Nature Center, which I've been to twice before, because I wanted to see the new Ross Marble Nature Area that they've added behind Mead's Quarry. I know that Knoxville used to have a booming marble industry, but I didn't know that it used to be called the Marble City. That explains why I drive past the Marble City Baptist Church on my way home every day (I thought Marble City was one of the smaller communities that has been absorbed into Knoxville over the years) and why we have so many former marbleworks around town. According to Wikipedia, Tennessee marble declined in popularity after World War II, and there are only six active quarries left that supply demand for it.

Anyway, since I read an article about it in the paper I've been meaning to go out and see the new trail since the new quarry isn't flooded like Mead's is. (I was tol that there's a spring in the bottom of Mead's, which the quarrying released. Mead's will be flooded forever unless the spring dries up.) It's also supposed to have some interesting formations built by the quarry workers, so I headed down the trail:



This was a bit of a bad idea, because we had thunderstorms yesterday, and the trail was really muddy. I didn't fall, but I did slip and twist my knee, which really hurt. Before anyone gets worried, I had my phone. Despite the mud, though, I had a great view of the two main features, and got to climb the scary steps:



made of marble slabs and chips that make up most the trail.

The main feature is the rock bridge:



The quarry workers built it to make it easier to get from one side of the quarry to the other, and the Ijam's volunteers added the railings. I hope they had some kind of railings when they used it, because the drop on either side is kind of far:



That view gives a good look at the terraces left by quarrying, which is one of the things that makes the site so fascinating. Along the bottom of each terrace, there are rows of holes, as if it has been perforated:



and each edge is grooved as well, like a corrugated tin roof. I'm sure this has something to do with the process by which marble is quarried, but beyond that I have no idea. Maybe they're drill holes? Or they stick dynamite in them? It's weird, because you just walk around the site and look at all these relics of the industry:



and try to imagine why what's left looks like that and what might have been there.

The other feature, the keyhole, is part of the rock bridge:



Since the bridge blocked access in one direction while facillitating access in another, the quarry workers built the keyhole in the base of the bridge so that they could cross into the quarry:



Once I did, though, I decided not to follow the steps down to the bottom, because it looked even muddier than the trail:



It was still an interesting hike, and when I left the nature center I was already close to my second goal for the day:



Our twelve foot statue of Alex Haley.

When I first moved to Knoxville, and I heard that our town housed things like the World's Largest Rubik's Cube:



I used to wonder why things like that were here. Now, though, I read that we have a giant statue of Alex Haley and I think, "Oh, OK. I should go take a picture." After all, the world's largest statue of Alex Haley has to end up somewhere, so why not here? I'm sure people with giant balls of twine or The World's Largest Ten Commandments have the same sense of placid acceptance. It turns out, though, that Alex Haley is listed as a famous Knoxvillian, so it sort of make sense that we would have something here to commemorate it, if only to compete with the Dolly Parton statue down the road.

It's actually a pretty nice statue. It's right next to a playground, and it really does look like Alex Haley:





Tina Allen:



did a really good job, although you do kind of wonder why, if she'd already signed the leg, she needed a huge plaque right on the front of the statue, too:



I realize credit should be given where due, but shouldn't the focus of the Alex Haley statue be Alex Haley?

I may never know the answer to that question (or I may, someday, if Tina Allen is a self-Googler) but let's look at what I did learn today:

1) Tennesse marble isn't actually true marble, but is instead crystallized limestone.
2) That Marble City was not a suburb, but was the city of Knoxville itself.
3) Alex Haley is from Knoxville.
4) Christina Hendricks, who plays Joan on "Mad Men", was born in Knoxville.

I look forward to photographing her large bronze statue.

Glimpses of Schenectady and Scotia

I've spent the last three nights in Scotia, New York, a town that I had never stayed in previous to Friday. I came for my friend Jen's wedding, but the wedding itself was an afternoon and evening affair, so I've had a lot of time to kill in between.

I spent some of that time crossing things off on my "going to New York" to-do list, which included things like driving in to Albany to go to my favorite bagel shop and getting an actual New York bagel:



I try to get a bagel at a bagel shop every time I am in New York, because I can't get them at home in Tennessee. Don't get me wrong: we have bagels in Tennessee, and even bagel shops, but something about them just doesn't taste the same. There's something about the consistency of the dough or the cooking process or something that always makes me think of Tennessee bagels as slightly soft, not crunchy on the outside and fluffy on the inside like a New York bagel. I can't really articulate the difference, but I know it's there, and no one can convince me otherwise.

Another item on my to-do list was to find the replica Statue of Liberty in downtown Schenectady. When I am traveling somewhere and have some control over what I can do there (as opposed to going to a conference, when I'm pretty much locked into that schedule) I look around on the internet to see what I might be missing, and I was delighted to discover that my hotel was just down the street from Schenectady's statue replica:



On looking closely, though, I noticed that the Statue had some rather unorthodox headgear:



Those are panties.

I wish I could say I was surprised by this, but I'm not. From where I stood to take that picture, I counted two people who seemed homeless and a handful of others scattered around the area that could also have been. A number of buildings facing the statue were closed, boarded up, and seemed abandoned, as a number of buildings in Schenectady are. The truth is that Schenectady is a sad, somewhat tragic shell of a city. Despite its somewhat exciting beginnings:



founded by the Dutch and burned to the ground during the French and Indian War, the city now is a crumbling husk. There are areas downtown that have experienced some urban renewal, but for the most part Schenectady is an industrial town whose industries have mostly departed, like a smaller scale version of Detroit, and the image of a disgraced Statue of Liberty seems rather apt for a town where the American dream has not come true.

Rather than dwell on it, though, I tried to look around for something to balance the overwhelming sense of despair that driving down Route 5 causes, and I was fortunate in that my hotel is not actually in Schenectady itself. It's across the Mohawk River in Scotia, and Scotia, though small, at least has some highlights. The river itself is very pretty as it winds alongside the town:



and there are cute restaurants:



and businesses that, while small, seem to be ok:



You even feel safe walking down the sidewalks to get to them. I probably will not visit Scotia again for a while, and hopefully not Schenectady, either, but it was nice to end my stay with a few good pictures rather than just the memory of broken, boarded windows and crumbling brick.

Odds and Ends

I have a random collection of images from the past couple of weeks that don't really go together or tell a story, but I like them and want to share. This being Tennessee, some of the "odds" are very odd, but I'm saving the best one for last. Skip to number nine if you want, but remember that some things, once seen, cannot be un-seen.

1) The Most Smartest Class Ever

Admissions has been telling us all year that the freshmen class that came in this fall is the smartest class ever, but I think they meant to say "most smartest", because I keep seeing things like this around campus:





Is it ever too early to start weeping for the future?

2) Trying Too Hard

This car was in front of Jeannie and I for a while on the way to the Auburn game a couple weeks ago:



One bumper sticker might be funny. Two, plus the "Fear This" graphic, plus the hanging skeleton in the back, plus the hologram skulls in the side windows (not pictured) is just too much. You just know the guy driving has double-dyed black hair, skinny jeans, and eyeliner, and his girlfriend's name has a Y where an I should be.

3) Sunrise, Sunset





Sometimes the sky is really pretty.

4) Jack O' Pepper

I saw this on the counter at lunch and it made me smile:



5) Golf Among the Ruins

I'm not sure how I found the website originally, but every month or so I check Roadside America for anything new in my area. In September, someone posted that there was a peeling hillbilly/pirate statue on Dollywood Lane that no one had noticed before, and sure enough, they were right. One of the dozen or so mini golf places closed, and is rapidly rotting in the heat and humidity:



I think the thing in his upraised hand was a sword, based on the hilt that's left. You can see it better here:



Even though the place is closed, the gate was partially open, and there wasn't a sign or anything, so I went in and poked around. The motel next door, the River Chase Motel, has been using it as a dumping ground for broken furniture, and most of the golf attractions are gone, but there's still a little to see and contemplate:









Someday I'll have to talk about my fascination with urban ruins. Probably with a therapist.

6) Gorilla Fireworks revisited

The first time I went to Pigeon Forge after moving here I drove past Gorilla Fireworks and snapped a quick picture from the car:



I don't usually take that route home from Pigeon Forge, so I haven't been past the store again, but I did today, and decided to pull in and see the gorillas up close:



I know this sounds odd when discussing a peeling concrete statue of an eyeless fuscia gorilla, but it seems oddly regal.

7) Sexy Stuf



I can't think of anything less sexy, as a noun or a verb, than the word "stuff". I'm not going to go all Miranda Priestly and give a ten minute lecture on "stuff" and how much it offends me and diminishes whatever it's talking about, but I would have liked to be a fly on the wall at the marketing meeting where they decided to call the store that and then decided to spell the word incorrectly.

8) Viva los Vols!

I don't usually approach the used bookstore from the interstate, so I never noticed this mural before:



Sadly, the restaurant it is painted on the side of is closed:



More urban ruins.

9) I laugh every time I look at this picture

I've noticed the Smoky Mountain Fantasy Golf before, and noticed that they had a pegasus in their waterfall. I never noticed before today, though, that the pegasus has dragon wings, and that it's anatomically correct. How on earth could you focus on golf with this staring at you?



It's like the side of a '70's era conversion van gone horribly, horribly wrong.

The guy at the booth wouldn't let me go in and walk around to take pictures without paying full price, but I saw everything I needed to from the parking lot.