Postblog from the Virginias: George Washington’s Nephew Slept Here

I may write a blog about what happened at the actual retreat, but it really was intense and I’m still processing. As you can see below, just getting there was an experience in itself.

I knew there would be rolling hills and in early November, a variety of colors from light brown to deep red, highlighting the heavily vegetated landscape. I knew that it made sense to fly into Washington DC to attend a retreat in West Virginia, only 63 miles – but at least two worlds – away.

I’m not unfamiliar with the region. I did time in the Old Dominion back when I was young.

What amazes me about the east is that everything is so close together. Yet these 63 miles from DC to WV, the distance from my Denver condo to my dad’s house in Fort Collins, couldn’t be more starkly different.

And the differences are sudden. When you cross a border here, you have really gone someplace.

I’m glad I sprung for GPS with the car rental.

The Virginias were not built on a grid. No road or highway goes in a straight line. When driving through “The District,” as some call the city of Washington, you start on a parkway. The GPS directs you to exit onto a little two-lane road which takes you to a major highway. Turn off onto another parkway going into suburban Virginia where you zig-zag over to a toll way which twists and turns toward the mountains, which (being from Colorado) you suspect is that little ridge up ahead.

Northern Virginia, at least this part, is dotted with gigantic new mansions. There is serious money up here. Everyone has room for horses and every home seems to have a greenhouse attached. Three or four story houses sit on lush grassy acres, the cuttings of which must be used to feed the horses.

I have never seen so many vineyards. Is Virginia known for wine? Sign after sign beckons me to come in for a taste, but I continue my journey, eager to reach my destination before dark.

I have the feeling that when it gets dark out here, it’s really dark.

There is no sense of direction when you are used to always having the Rocky Mountains on the west. Without the reassuring instructions of the electronic GPS voice, I wouldn’t have any confidence I was going the right direction.

Sure enough that little ridge marks the border to West Virginia. The mansions with horses suddenly give way to ordinary houses featuring multiple pickups in front. Vineyards yield to bait and tackle. The only large new buildings are churches.

My retreat is in an historic mansion which sits on a 300 acre plantation said to have once been owned by George Washington’s nephew. I have no reason to doubt the pedigree, but it does seem that to give anything legitimacy in these parts, there has to be some connection to old George, or at least Thomas Jefferson.

The problem with this mansion, though it dates back to the 1820s, is that the GPS doesn’t know about it.

This remarkable feat of technology, in communication with satellites high above the earth, directs me to turn off the state highway onto a county road and proceed for 20 miles. I’m then told by the feminine GPS voice to turn at the corner where a paved road, one lane wide, circles some scary, rednecky looking mobile homes.

“Mabel,” I hear clearly in my mind, “Where’s the shotgun? There’s a stranger drivin’ on our land.”

The pavement becomes dirt by a wood where four deer leap in front of the car just as the road comes to a sudden end.

“You have reached your destination,” the GPS happily intones.

Uh, no, I haven’t. I have no idea where I am.

I consult the directions I printed out on Google-Maps before I left home. They make no sense at all. I am lost.

Long story short (too late, I know), I get Zelda (the name I’ve given the GPS lady – we’ve grown close over the past few hours) to direct me to a Pizza Hut in the little town a couple of ridges over. After driving back and forth around West Virginia’s Panhandle, taking many false turns but seeing lots of beautiful country, I finally arrive at George Washington’s nephew’s plantation.

It’s only 63 miles from National Airport, but look how far I’ve come. It must have seemed a universe away two centuries ago. I guess folks back then knew how to get around without help from Zelda. Or else they were smart enough to just stay at home where they belonged.

Their Mountains are Older

“The Great Smokies are the largest single mountain range …”

So begins a quote from the Smoky Mountain News of Waynesville, NC, February 14, 2003. The sentence widens my eyes and a major objection commences in the back of my Colorado throat.

“… in Eastern North America.”

While calmed by the qualifier, I still roll my eyes at the tone of the claim.

The quote kicks off a mystery novel I just started, High Country Fall, by Margaret Maron.

Maron’s mysteries spill beyond the genre into literature. She has a way of capturing the modern rural south (no, it’s not an oxymoron) which makes you feel like you are there. When the primary character, Debra Knott, swelters in a North Carolina summer, the sweat drips down my back. When she chats with neighbors at a large community picnic, my mouth waters for the ham, fried chicken, and biscuits they eat.

I “did time” living in the south, pursuing my graduate degree 20 years ago, in Richmond, Virginia. To say perspectives vary between regions of the country is an understatement. For example, I couldn’t get used the Virginian reverence for war heros – I’m talking about the Civil War, which was fought over 140 years ago. Even in the artsy, hipster part of town called The Fan, Monument Avenue is dotted regularly with magnificent statues of Confederate generals. Stonewall Jackson was less than a block from my apartment. To hear some (not all, to be fair) Richmonders discuss the war, you’d think they were talking about events which happened to them personally. The bitterness against the North is, for some, as fresh as if the “the war of Northern aggression” were still being fought.

When I lived there, I bristled at being called a Yankee. I am from the West. My state didn’t exist during the War Between the States. That anyone from outside is considered a Yankee, no matter where they are from, relegated me to the status of foreign visitor. While always treated with courtesy, I would never outlive my outsider standing.

Not that I was always a paragon of tact and tolerance, myself. I didn’t make any friends by saying, for example, “The war is over. You lost. Get over it.”

The quote about the Smokies reminds me of my reaction to hearing Virginians extol the virtues of their own Blue Ridge Mountains.

Though technically not yet a Coloradoan, I looked down my long nose at the locals and told them that if they wanted to see real mountains, I’d be happy to take them up to, say, Trail Ridge Road in Rocky Mountain National Park.

While unable to deny that the Rockies are quite impressive, my friends in Richmond sniffed, “Your mountains may be bigger, but ours are older.” End of conversation.

I grew to appreciate those beautiful little eastern mountains, dripping with history and character. And I would recommend a drive along the Blue Ridge Parkway anytime.

Meanwhile, if anyone from back east would like to see some snow, in July, at 13,000 feet, just give me a call.