Dear Friends and Family,
“Hey kids, you wanna buy some drugs”
PSYCHE it’s an optical illusion! My head is not, in fact, on a platter, and is actually still firmly attached to my body (not that there seems to be any communication between the brain and the hands that type out these posts)!
Such are the optical tricks you can find at the Illusion Museum in Atlanta, Georgia!
Some illusions are more impressive than others ¯\_(ツ)_/¯.
After leaving Springer Mountain under somewhat complicated circumstances (text me if you want details), I went towards Atlanta for a surprise visit to my Mom and Dad. Mom and Dad live in Michigan, of course, but they were staying in Atlanta for a few days while my Dad was doing a consulting job. We met up over the weekend in what would have been a birthday surprise birthday present for Mom, but *ahem* miscommunication between Dad and I foiled the surprise 😅.
I think Mom was happy nonetheless 🙂
We enjoyed a couple hours at the High Art Museum (named both after the surname of the main philanthropist behind the museum and for the quality of art on display, in a great example of nominative determinism):
God I wish I could pull these off, but I already stumble like a newborn deer in just 3″ heels.
My Mom, getting ideas for her workout routine. No, she is not aware of the Bouldering Project, but yes, I told her she would fit in well there (along with 75% of the DC population).
It was a lovely time! I’m very glad to have caught up with my folks and to have been able to share a small portion of my road trip with them 🙂 After the High Art Museum, we went out to dinner and got a few small treats from a Korean Bakery. I did manage to sneak one small surprise in there, by sneaking some candles onto her treat 🙂
Happy Birthday Mom! I love you ❤️
All told, it was a really nice time 🙂
Dear reader, you will hear this from me often on this blog: the thing that I regret the most from my 2023 road trip is that I wasn’t able to share the fun of that trip with the people I care about. I am very grateful to be able to fix that problem in 2026 💙
So we had fun! But eventually, it was time to move on. Mom and Dad and I said our goodbyes (well, me to them, not them to one another. That would make for an awkward drive back to Michigan) and I kept heading west from Atlanta.
Unfortunately, west from Atlanta is this Godforsaken state:
Defend your right to what you fucking schmucks? Commit hate crimes?
And west of that is this statistically significant shithole:
Mississippi was invented so that all the other states didn’t have to be the worst at something.
I’m not going to dwell on what happened in these states because it doesn’t really bring the right vibe to the blog, and I was just trying to pass through them on the way to somewhere else anyways. All I’ll say is this: do not stop anywhere in Alabama or Mississippi if you are visibly queer in any way, no matter how small. The best-case scenario is that you will be scowled at and mean-mugged by everyone who sees you; the worst case is that people will actively size you up to see if they can beat the shit out of you in broad daylight. I had both happen to me. Text me if you want more details, but in summary: FUCK Alabama and FUCK Mississippi.
Aaaaaanyways, Louisiana is a far more pleasant state to be in:
Rip Van Winkle Botanical Gardens in New Iberia Parish. Surprisingly, this was not a plantation house! It was a winter cottage built by a famous actor from the North.
My dear Aunt Jeannie lives in New Iberia, Louisiana, and we had a grand old time hanging out, exploring the area, eating excellent Cajun food, and playing table games together. I am very lucky my Aunt Jeannie doesn’t play for money, because if she did, friends, I would be eating a lot more canned beans on this road trip!
This wonderful aunt is a SHARK and don’t let anyone tell you otherwise!
We also had a lovely time looking through some old photo albums, which included photos of family members I had never actually seen before!
This is my great-great grandfather, Columbus Washington Lee, who was born sometime in 1841, pictured here possibly in the 1890s. I suspect this is the earliest Lee family member for which we have a photo. I also believe he was the last Lee able to successfully grow a beard and moustache, before the gene for beards patchier than a quilt got introduced into our family.
And here is my great-grandfather, Levi Earl Lee, born in 1890. He is pictured with his wife, Wilhelmina (Wilma) Lee (nee Stickney). Here is another photo when he was older:
Apparently, tipping your head back slightly while you smile in order to hide your hairline is a family trait 😅
Seeing these photos of Levi Earl Lee (he went by Earl) was very moving for me. Levi was the first person in my family to have the middle name Earl; in honor of him, every first-born son since had the middle name Earl. My grandfather was Roger Earl Lee, his first son is my uncle, William Earl Lee, and his son is BJ Earl Lee, and his son’s middle name is Earl as well. My father’s middle name is not Earl, since he was a second son, but mine is, and I imagine my (eventual) child’s middle name will be Earl as well.
But even more important than that, Levi Earl Lee was also the first engineer in my family. I am the second, and for as much trouble as naval engineering causes me, anyone can tell you that being an engineer is a huge part of my identity. Levi Earl Lee even had his own stamp, a brass hammer with a small heart emboss that he would smack against the steam engines he’d inspected to indicate they were fit for service. When I finally became a PE and earned a right to my own stamp this past fall, I finally felt like I’d earned my own name.
Here’s a photo of my grandfather when he was two, in 1922! Grandpa was so old when I knew him (he was 75 when I was born and 88 when he passed), I wasn’t entirely sure he had ever been young. A note included with this letter stated “Roger is so LARGE, we are very happy at how much he is growing” 💙
And here’s a photo of my Grandpa and Grandma (Marion Lee, nee Barber), when they met in Deming, New Mexico during WWII 🙂 Grandpa was in the Army Air Corps (the Air Force hadn’t been created yet) and Grandma was in the Women’s Army Corps.
I’m very lucky to have known my Grandpa, but I wish I’d been able to meet my great grandfather as well. I would love to ask him what he thought of low-sulphur sub-bituminous coal replacing anthracite for power generation, and also if he had ever played hockey.
Stained glass hummingbird in my Aunt Jeannie’s kitchen window.
Thank you, Aunt Jeannie, for letting me hang out with you! I had a wonderful time, and I look forward to you coming out and visiting me in DC sometime next year!
And so, I kept moving on:
Between my Mom, my Dad, and my Aunt Jeannie, the east had been fun. But it was time to dispense with the endless deciduous forests I call home and move into wilder territory. I spent essentially the entire next two days hauling across Texas:
You can tell how far west you’re going by how much the price of avocados falls as you travel. When you see them going 10-for-a-dollar, the Pacific will have gotten your feet wet.
I think it’s fair to say that I was getting pretty frantic about getting to “The West” now, however you term that. I ticked off the first 3000 miles of this trip in under 10 days, all of them hurtling towards the Sacramentos, that first great shore beyond the prairie sea. I swam through that tall grass like I was afraid of drowning in it; I flailed and front-crawled it all the way through, until the hay and hillsides gave way to srub and scabland, and then that too dissolved into sand and sagebrush and cactus thorn. The sightlines were lengthening; the flora grew shallower by the mile. I felt myself rising out of the sea; those first breaths of air were intoxicating.
But first,
It’s time for a little side trip 😉
That’s all for now,
Stay well everyone,
Evan 💙