Hit The Road!

It began simple enough. How my poor children ever reached their current ages without a meal at Waffle House, I'll never know. Our journey began with breakfast and the discussion of exciting plans.

The road was kind to us and the HOV lane helped us proceed through Atlanta relatively easily. They say the best thing to ever come out of Atlanta was I-75. 

We found the southbound version.

With great traffic and the skillful navigation of a great driver (me), good companionship from my family and perhaps a few tips from the Google map voice that lives in my phone we arrived at Ocmulgee National Monument.

It's places like Ocmulgee that get overlooked in the study of Southern History. And that's a shame because at the estimated date of 15,000 years ago people began to inhabit this location. The first bunch were nomadic people which simply means they were, like us, on a road trip. (Although theirs was at least marginally longer).

                                                                                                                                                    

The Earth Lodge

Somewhere in the centuries people settled down. And they lived off of agriculture, the industry of the South. You see, the South, from the very beginning depended on nature for survival. While Europe and the North were spewing carbon and other so-called "greenhouse gasses" into the atmosphere, the South was relying on plants, forests, rivers and the sun for survival. The people depended on these resources to be healthy and abundant in order to make any sort of living. Factories and pollution were imported later on and, now that we're dependent on it, are now demonized and regulated by the very folks that forced it upon us.

Make up your mind!

The Temple Mound

Back to the mounds. Seeing the work that it took to build such structures and the care and dedication it took to carry basket after basket of dirt to create such monuments really impressed me. The Earth Lodge with it's original floor, dated ca. 1000 AD is truly amazing. There is also a very good view of Downtown Macon from atop the Temple Mound. Throw in a good museum and an outstanding ranger and it made for a great morning.

We spent the afternoon 22 miles down the road at the Museum of Aviation in Warner Robins. If you are ever in that part of Georgia and have even the slightest interest in the history of the Air Force and/or Army Air Corps, stop in. The museum has excellent exhibits, including the living ones you'll find working in each hangar. Many of the volunteers manning the museum are veterans of the very aircraft on display and are ready to answer questions and give first hand accounts of history made with these machines.

Ok, time for a candid moment. During the tour, we happened upon a couple of gentlemen and a conversation ensued. At first it was great, lots of good information as one of the men was himself a vet that shared information of his experiences. However, there is a butt...er...but to this part of the story. The gentleman explained to us, after learning about our road trip plans, that he was from Pennsylvania and stressed his displeasure with "that stupid, stupid Civil War". He then progressed to deride the Confederate soldiers and to talk about what a terrible place Georgia is. In fact, it is so terrible that he chose to live in Dublin. Then he pulled out some story about what a great humanitarian Sherman was. He finished his speech with some of his disappointment with the direction that our country is going and blamed our central government for it. Really? I was laughing as I thought it inappropriate to cry in a hanger full of fighter planes. Oh how I wished to correct him, oh how I wished to sling a 30 minute soliloquy on him to point out that his beloved Sherman had forced that strong central government on us all at gunpoint and then invite him to return to Pennsylvania...but self-control got the better of me. I sat there with the words of the sage ringing in my ears - "It wastes your time and annoys the pig."

As the sun set on the first day of the Georgia trip, having seen the contributions of Native Americans from the Mississippians to the Creeks (Muscogee) and members of the Air Force, including the 332nd fighter group, "The Tuskegee Airmen", I was glad to have started to demonstrate the diversity of the people that made Georgia and the South great.

The first day didn't challenge my thinking the way the following days would. It wasn't very controversial. But it was quite enjoyable and laid the foundation for the days that followed. The next day would hold surprises I could not expect and tore at my heart in ways that I don't even think my family realized...

...but tomorrow is another day...

All the Biscuits in Georgia Road Trip!

We just have returned from what has become an annual tradition, the Georgia Road Trip. These adventures have carried us along the coast, up into the misty mountains and now along the fields and now through the fields and forests of South Georgia.

While family fun is the ultimate goal of these outings, the overall outcome is growth. We learn about our state, our history, our heritage, the world around us and, through all of these, we learn about ourselves. 

And so I bring the concepts of this most recent trip, the thoughts and ramblings of a man fresh off a close-quarter encounter with the love of his life and his offspring. Over the next few posts I'll be sharing what we learned. I promise that it will not be a generic slide show depicting "what I did on my summer vacation." It will be commentary on what it all means.

By request, I'll address some issues that came up in discussions before the trip but that were very pertinent to at least one stop along the way. I'll throw in my commentary about what much of the information means for us today. And, yes, I'll be including some pretty candid confessions about my experiences with a couple of chief executives that I didn't care much for.

So, stay tuned! In the course of over 500 miles driven, 15,000 years of history, at least a dozen wars, three branches of military service and three presidential administrations and 5 school bus loads of watermelons I came up with some interesting things to say. At least I find them interesting. 

Besides, it's not every day that you encounter 5 bus loads of watermelons...

Declaration

Well, the 4th is upon us.

It seems sort of counterproductive to write about the 4th as I first sit down to begin this. After all, there was so much written that led up to the Declaration. Most of those writings are far better than anything you'll see on this blog and were written by men far more knowlegable and talented than I am, that's for sure.

And then came that night when the smartest of all Americans, Thomas Jefferson himself, sat down and drug his quill across the parchment and formed the characters

IN CONGRESS, JULY 4, 1776

The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America

And then he wrote a scathing, although gentlemanly, critique of the most powerful man on the planet using concepts and grievances assembled by the most brilliant minds of those thirteen States. Some of them believed in unparalleled freedom. And others were Federalists. But they all had one thing in mind...the current government had to go.

The main team working on the Declaration was an interesting alliance. Thomas Jefferson was the young up-and-coming genius, well known for his brilliant writing. His good friend John Adams was a little older and sat at the opposite end of the political spectrum from Jefferson. Benjamin Franklin was sort of like the wise old uncle of the bunch. A genius in his own right, he offered guidance to the Congress and his wisdom was an invaluable resource in the founding of the nation.

Basically these men (mostly Jefferson, of course) laid out an organized plan: "All the people you are taxing to death and shooting holes in are angry - every last one of them. We have a God-given right to govern ourselves and if that government gets rotten we have the right to throw it away and start over. Here's a list of the absurd things you're doing to us, proving that your government is indeed rotten. We've begged you to quit and every time you just get worse."

And then the most glorious part of all. The best, most wonderful and awesome part of all. Too awesome for a paraphrase:  

"We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these united Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor."

See the "u" in "united"? Quite possibly the smallest "u" I've ever seen in all my life. Then there is the part about "Free and Independent States." S-T-A-T-E-S. Plural. Thirteen Nations, under God, Independent, with liberty and justice for all.

Watch each other's back but stay out of each other's business. Interesting concept.

Thus ends my Antifederalist rant for this article.

Back to the men with the ink. The amazing thing about the Declaration (besides it's unashamed endorsement of Antifederalism) is that it was written in the age of the Divine Right of Kings. This philosophy held that the king was the rightful ruler, ordained by God to lead the people. The Declaration was a total disregard of that philosophy and in turn professed that God's ordination rested upon each individual and that those individuals transferred that power to a limited government that would keep the basic order in society but otherwise leave men free to live their lives.

So these men assembled and composed this document to tell off the ruler of a plurality of the world while we can't clean up Congress in an election year. We have grown adults who have never lived under a Presidential administration that was familiar with the Constitution or at least one that obeyed it. Many of the usurpations listed in the Declaration are carried out daily by our current government and the founding fathers left us with the cleanest bloodless way of fixing that problem that the world has ever seen. I'm not making an endorsement this early but I will say that (as of this date) Hillary Clinton, Joe Biden, Chris Christie, Paul Ryan & Marco Rubio are horrible, terrible, no good, very bad candidates. Do not vote for any of them in primaries or otherwise, even as a joke.

One other note, some 87 years, to the week, after the Declaration was adopted, those States met on the field of battle, this time as enemies. They fought, not over slavery like modern history books would have you believe, but over these very principles as laid out in the founding document. During those three days, two percent of the American population ended that battle killed, captured, wounded or missing. Adjusted for modern populations, that's six million people dead, injured or otherwise unaccounted for in a single battle in a single town.

And we make excuses. "Have you ever read the Declaration if Independence?" "Nope, TLDR". "Are you familiar with Gettysburg?" "Yep, that's where Lincoln freed the slaves"."What do you know about Thomas Jefferson?" "That he's old and doesn't matter anymore."

And then they gripe when their taxes go up or when the government is reading their emails or when some other usurpation of their freedom smacks them in the face.

“There is nothing which I have found to require a greater effort of patience than to bear the criticisms of the ignorant.” - Pres. Jefferson Davis, CSA

So it goes.

Here's a friendly challenge. Sometime over the next week, read the Declaration of Independence and take a moment to remember the men that fought at Gettysburg as well as the civilian casualties and all the bystanders that worked so hard to alleviate the suffering of all involved. Maybe even take a few more minutes to try to figure out what went on there and why.

Regardless, here's hoping you have a happy 4th from everyone here at AtBiG. And on this Independence Day, may God bless the fifty united States of America.