All that planning. It made much more sense to go somewhere, hang out, stay till it feels right to leave and then leave. Don’t make plans. Don’t be tied to a schedule. The whole point of being by yourself is to be selfish about the “What do I fancy doing today?” thing. And what a fantastic indulgence / opportunity for someone like me to have. I might be an empty nester, but it’s not that empty. And blimmin hurrah for that.
The next stop was Atlanta, Georgia and that’s as different as different can be on every level. Apart from the places, New York was with Greg – young, free and living in a one bed urban apartment, Atlanta was Josh, married with an eight year old daughter and dog, living in a detached house in the wide open spaces of the Atlanta suburb of Marietta. In New York, you want a bagel you walk to the bagel shop. In Atlanta you want a bagel, you get in the car. (You still get the bagel with lox – it’s not that different down South).
Again, a very lucky bunny, courtesy of extraordinary hospitality and warmth. Michael, the Uber guy, was – as it said on the Uber app – a “great conversationalist”, which meant we spent the 30 mins ride to Josh’s house talking about Trump (not a fan), racism (still exists because it exists everywhere, but no worse here than anywhere else), chickens…
“There are three huge, and I mean huge, chicken factories here. We like chicken down here”
“Georgia’s not a good place to be a chicken”
“No, it is not”
and Trump.
Michael told me why he didn’t like Trump.
Me: “Michael – where I come from, that’s called socialism”
Michael: “……..”
Not entirely sure it’s cool to call yourself socialist here.
Michael said that Josh’s place was very central, easy to get everywhere. And, for Atlanta, it is. But that just says that Atlanta’s a sprawl, which makes complete sense. There’s space to sprawl here. The roads are wide, the houses (in the suburbs) all have big front gardens, they’re all detached. It looks very clean and very straight. There’s no litter, no graffiti, no dirt – and it looks very familiar from a thousand American films and TV shows. Most of the American films I’m thinking of have been made by John Carpenter, but…. I like John Carpenter.
In by now the great tradition, Josh took me to the baseball and it was great to go to the game cos that’s another ‘first’ ticked off the list, but… I’m not sure about baseball. Bloke throws the ball, bloke tries to hit it. Mostly the bloke who’s trying to hit it misses, but sometimes he doesn’t. Baseball. I don’t know. I suppose they’d say that foo… soccer was blokes running around kicking a ball. There’s a lot of hanging around and the action is much shorter but the whole game is much longer. On the plus side, the clothes are much better in baseball, the shirts much more stylish. (You can tell I used to be a sports journalist and now teach sports journalism).
One thing that was evident is that this is a consumption culture. The cars are big. They’re still those big, chunky SUV things, more often than not with a pick up shape. Big, bull-nosed things. We spoke lots and hybrids are becoming a thing, but you look around here and still people love their cars.
Josh, being one of the Brothers, drove a Volvo.
And this might be unfair to say, because we’re at the ball game, but they eat. Big food, big hot food. And no one’s too fussed abut single use plastic. But, like I say, it’s probably unfair to say, because we’re at the ball game. If you went to a foo… soccer game at home, it’s probably not a whole lot different. The food would probably be worse, the portions smaller, but the ideas the same.
I had a bar-be-que pulled chicken sandwich with jalapenos and bar-be-que sauce. Like the weather, it was hot. And talking of the weather, it’s hot. Yesterday was 100 degrees and, like the sandwich, that’s hot. Everything’s hot here. After the game we went home and did the family thing which, again, was a lovely contrast. Bouncy daughter, bouncier dog – Oliver’s a sweetie, very bouncy, very licky, very sweet – and we watched the quite astonishing Nadal v Medvedev match, an extraordinary contest, five sets, five hours and eventually, of course, Nadal won.
Josh took the next day off and we played tourist. Went to the Martin Luther King Center (after, of course, a bagel stop) which is so peaceful and calm, everywhere you look there’s reminders of his gentle wisdom and in the age of Trump, Johnson, Corbyn, Brexit and all that it’s impossible not to be simultaneously impressed by how we can be and depressed by how we are. Who was it who said we get the politicians we deserve? Everyone probably.
We melted back into the car and drove through Cabbagetown, a newly gentrified part of inner city town, all arts graffiti and cafes. Everywhere’s the same. People move to the suburbs, the inner city gets neglected, the arts people go back to the inner city cos it’s cheap, it becomes all hipster and the locals get squeezed. Cabbagetown and Hackney Wick and all points in between.
Little Five Points looked like it had always been cool. A little bit hippie, a little bit biker chic. Vintage clothes, vegan cafes, live music venues, record shops and more places to get your chakras balanced than you could throw your CBD oil at. I liked it.
But it didn’t pay to walk around because it was hot.