"The Goddess Kali at Cold Harbor Battlefield" (c) 2008

"The Goddess Kali at Cold Harbor Battlefield, Virginia" (c) 2007, 2008 Stu Jenks

    When I fly to The River, I land in Richmond, the Capital of the Confederacy. I rent a car or a truck and take a short cut through the thick woods to hook up with Route 360, avoiding the Interstate completely. Along the way, I skirt the Malvern Hill and Cold Harbor National Battlefields. And these days when I'm returning to Richmond International after a visit to the Rappahannock, I stop at Cold Harbor and pay my respects. What were mostly open fields in June of 1864 are now hardwoods and pines growing up from the old eroding earthworks. But the Park Service did leave the largest field of battle tree-free. So unlike most small Civil War battlefields, it still looks close to how it was 140 years ago.
    First time I came here in the 1990's, I cried hard, as much for my dying father as for the ghosts of the Union dead. Today, I just stopped and made a couple of cell phone calls, finished my Diet Coke and took a few time-travel shots of a hundred-year-old poplar tree. It's overcast today with a sprinkling of rain. It's a damp cold that seeps into the bones. A nice change from the desert cold I'm used to but I'm happy that I don't live here anymore, for a good number of reasons, not just the cold or the mosquitoes. I haven't called The South home for over twenty years. But I know the speech. I understand the people. Yet my heart resides atop a Mesquite-covered hill north of Tucson.
    But no matter where my heart lives, I am a Son of Virginia nonetheless. I have a burial plot of my own, that I may or may not use, at St. Mary's Whitechapel in Lively, Virginia, and I am happy that I have the option to eternally rest in the Old Dominion (even though my guess is my friends will take my ashes to Owl's Head instead.) I love Collard greens, Krispy Kreme donuts and Camel cigarettes and I relate well to people who pray. And I have a hard time with hardcore Yankees from New York City who think they are smarter than me, just because they were born above the Mason-Dixon line. And when someone mentions the name of Robert E. Lee, I instinctively nod my head and lower my eyes.
    I am a Son of Virginia and here at Cold Harbor, for just a few days in 1864, we were victorious. Not that Slavery or State Rights were just causes. It's just nice to remember a moment when Virginia won.

[For my information about the Battle of Cold Harbor, go to the Wikipedia link at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Cold_Harbor. It's a good and accurate site.]

 

Comments

[lamabombpruf]

spent time at Bemis Heights Vermont..seems I am a Bemis directly from the friggin Mayflower just like Obama-a regular 32nd degree mason..lickin' the lost will of slavery...

[Stu Jenks]

My mother Mary grew up in Alexandra, Virginia that has the Mason's Tower. Quite something. I think she can be a DAR but she is much too liberal to do that