We got back on the road at 7 AM on Tuesday, heading for Mississippi. Not much to report about the scenery. Mostly scrubby, sandy, and wet. Pine trees and marsh. Houses were mostly small and weathered, made of cinderblock, and single story. Cars, on the other hand, were not old. More pickup trucks. When we got to Meridian, I said we should go through the town just to see what it looked like. Jon read about it on his phone. It used to be a major crossroads for lots of trains crisscrossing the state, but no longer. It didn't look remarkable but it was a real town with a downtown, the usual perimeter of chain stores and we even drove through a historic part that had lots of nice houses of diverse designs.
Decided to have barbecue at a real place in Tupelo and found a one-of-a-kind place that did not disappoint. Delicious.
Before we got to my cousin Howard's house, I tried to guess what it would be like. I hit it right on the head. An upscale neighborhood with suburban amenities (a lake right outside) because he is the kind of guy who would have a job that pays better than some, is frugal, and grew up living in upscale neighborhoods. Jon and I haven't really seen him since the 1980s when he was a teenager on the farm for a few seasons but we see his parents relatively often and we still feel connected.
Howard looks just like Uncle Babe, sort of. He looks like Charles too, sort of. He is cute as a button, with grey hair now. He and his wife Sarah and their son welcomed us warmly.
We got a private tour (from Howard) of some of St. Jude's Hospital for Children. He is a Director of Continuous Improvement in the fundraising side of the operation -- has been working there for ten years, helping to identify ways to make the processes better. No marketing and no working with donors directly but lots of analyzing. He is doing good work and he likes it. The hospital keeps expanding so there is no end to the construction and upgrading, and it costs over two million dollars a day to keep everything going. It seems like an incredibly ambitious effort but it keeps on getting bigger ever since 1962. Danny Thomas would be amazed.
We met Sarah and Alex for dinner in a restaurant inside the pyramid along the Mississippi River that is occupied by the Bass Pro Shop. I had said that I wasn't very interested in seeing that flagship store but Howie overruled me, saying it is a spectacle worth visiting. It is indeed a spectacle. Inside the giant pyramid there is a world of fake bald cypress trees draped with Spanish moss, lakes with big fish and actual alligators, mountains covered with stuffed mountain goats and black bears and deer and elk, aquariums with large catfish and bass of many types and long skinny fish with pointy snouts or beaks. There are boats and camping gear sprinkled around but it doesn't feel like a place to buy things, exactly. It is an entertainment space. We had fish for dinner and walked around afterwards, admiring the all-terrain vehicles and boats that capture Alex's imagination.
usual, we covered a lot of conversational ground in an afternoon and evening and there is much more to talk about so we hope they will come and see us sometime. And I am going to encourage people to come to Memphis because Howard is still the same sweet person he was when he was growing up.
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