Category: Uncategorized
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Southern Sojourn Day 12: 24 May 2022 Asheville > Greensboro NC
The morning is clear, and as I pack up to leave, the sun shining through the Best Western window catches an accidental prism somewhere that refracts the light into its constituent wavelengths, filling my open suitcase with Roy G. Biv’s rainbow—the mnemonic I learned from David: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet. I…
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Happy Birthday, Virginia
Happy Birthday # 99 to Virginia Ruth Senseman Murphy 17 June 1923–2 January 2008 Artist, Bookkeeper, Family Historian, Seamstress Devoted Homemaker Beloved Friend, Daughter, Sister, Wife Best of Mothers
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Southern Sojourn Day 11: 23 May 2022 Asheville NC
The rain has continued into the morning, but Mark, Olivia, and I nevertheless head to downtown Asheville for breakfast at the Early Girl before I return Mark to the Beaucatcher Road bungalow where he is working on installing crown molding in the living room. He and Susan are hoping to put their little cottage on…
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Southern Sojourn Day 10: 22 May 2022 Chattanooga TN > Asheville NC
Pete is up before us, but Karen and I breakfast on eggs I scramble with last night’s garlic potatoes; Karen praises these, despite her having prepared those excellent potatoes the night before: ever the generous teacher, she is, heaping praise and encouragement. Over coffee, Pete confesses falling for Karen from the moment he first saw…
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Southern Sojourn Day 9: 21 May 2022 Sewanee TN
I write this account of a day spent largely at Sewanee, the University of the South, nearly a month past my visit to the “Domain,” and just as the second public hearing of the House Investigation of January 6 Committee has adjourned. Personal history and history being made are colliding, especially given the founding principles…
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Southern Sojourn Day 8: 20 May 2022 Danville KY > Chattanooga TN
My last stop in Danville is breakfast at The Early Bird: avocado toast with poached egg—a combo unheard of in the Danville of my first acquaintance in 1984, when even fresh seafood was impossible to get and dry Boyle County necessitated planning way ahead to buy anything alcoholic. I head south on 127, the route…
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Southern Sojourn Day 7: 19 May 2022 Danville KY
A day of lucky little breaks and long-time friendships renewed, starting with a visit to the Constitution Square gift shop in search of postcards, a commodity increasingly hard to find. Success: I spy lots of Ephraim McDowell House cards, honoring the surgeon who performed the first abdominal surgery on Christmas morning, 1809, removing a 22.5-pound…
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Southern Sojourn Day 6: 18 May 2022 Danville KY
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…
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Southern Sojourn Day 5: 17 May 2022 Charleston WV > Danville KY
While at the standard free Comfort Inn breakfast in Charleston WV, I again complimented the manager on his pleasant and immaculate establishment—the opposite of its forbidding exterior appearance. Overhearing me, another guest chimed in, similarly impressed. The manager then elaborated on the motel’s complete renovation, and how every day through COVID he and his family…
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Southern Sojourn Day 4: 16 May 2022 Woodbridge VA > Charleston WV
Packed the car and left Woodbridge, phone functioning (hallelujah), about 10.30 and drove west through the Shenandoah Valley under magnificent clouds and light rain, shafts of light breaking through the blue and grey, making the hills preternaturally green and lush, miles and miles of that fresh green breast of the new world. I’m singing “Oh,…
Georgeann Murphy 