I quote from the pamphlet available at 105 E. Walnut Street in Danville: “Constitution Square Historic Site was the birthplace of Kentucky’s statehood. In 1776, Kentucky was still a frontier and a county of Virginia. The Wilderness Road, blazed by Daniel Boone [thanks to Fess Parker, a girlhood crush], led pioneers through the Cumberland Gap and into Central Kentucky. Danville’s prominent location on the Wilderness Road caused it to become a crossroad for early settlers and a center of political activity. By 1785, Danville was chosen as Kentucky’s first seat of government; and a meetinghouse, courthouse and jail were built to administer the growing territory.”

My southern sojourn to visit friends, I realize, is also inadvertently becoming a search for America (cue Paul Simon’s “American Tune”:  “You can’t be forever blessed”).  Danville is a key site in my personal history, locus of my ever-so-lucky-to-have-gotten tenure-track position at little Centre College (so named for its geographic centrality in Kentucky), from which all future happy developments sprang:  tenure at Centre led me to London and to David, the reason I ultimately left my perfect-for-me position to live with my husband in New Hampshire.  I still get weepy over “My Old Kentucky Home” on Derby Day, and after Bill and Grazia’s warm welcome yesterday, I am eager to reconnect with one of the two women who helped guide my entry into professorial life.

I pretty much skipped breakfast, knowing the luncheon my esteemed mentor at Centre and long-time friend Bobbie prepared would be substantial . . .

My arrival chez Bobbie so slightly precedes that of another colleague and friend of Centre days that I startle her popping out of my car. Kathy is a willowy, long-haired blonde wind of a Kentucky girl whose comfort once got me through a lovelorn breakup with a bad boyfriend and advice later gave me courage to return the love of the good man I would eventually marry.  She keeps Bobbie supplied with irises.

From Bobbie, I learned how to run a department meeting, how to be a good colleague (precious few models of that at Tulane!), and how to face adversity chin up, wit and sense of humor intact.  Bobbie once dubbed the handsome but non-academic administrator/former frat boy I cast as Theseus in my production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream “the DKE of Athens,” one of her many spontaneous and on-target quips.  Even in recovery from a difficult surgery with a disappointing outcome, she has prepared for Kathy and me an elegant meal, and the table conversation–funny recollections and news of the many changes at Centre since my departure in ’95 (the foundational Humanities program is defunct?!  Is’t possible?)—is both nostalgic and hilarious, even as a prelude to my driving Bobbie to her daily radiation treatment.  At the Ephraim McDowell Commonwealth Cancer Center, Bobbie clearly knows her way around, and the staff make me welcome, too, complimenting my hairdo (!!). More affable southern charm. 

The treatment session is brief, and I return Bobbie to her lovely home and arrive back at “the little house” just in time to beat the big afternoon Kentucky thunderstorm that blows in and conveniently out again before I meet up once more with Kathy and another good friend, classicist and poet Jane, at very lively restaurant downtown now in its third iteration since I left Danville.  We three try to catch up over BBQ pork sandwiches, collard greens, and the din of an adjacent birthday party.  Kathy gives me an “Art Local Danville KY” t-shirt that I treasure.

I return to Bill and Grazia’s, this time with a PowerPoint slide show of my September visit to the Amalfi Coast. 

Of course a cultured, well-educated Florentine and an art historian specializing in the Renaissance know much more about the scenes I show than I.  I am nevertheless pleased to offer a few shots of some places they had NOT visited, so all three of us take away something new:  another so lovely evening in such gracious company.  Grazia is tired from her long day of counseling the troubled, but true to her name walks me back to the little house, and I am again grateful for her insight and always endearing company.  It’s been a day spent in the company of strong, admirable women. I am content.