Born and raised in Philadelphia, I attended Wilkes University - a college in a small town in the coal country of Northeastern Pennsylvania. At the start of my senior year, I was dead certain that I was headed to New York to start my life and career as an actor. (Having majored in theatre, it would have made sense.) The following years, however, saw me working in politics, in and out of Washington, and behind a desk for a major defense contractor. After almost four years, and well into the recession, I was laid off as a matter of course. I searched high and low for a job, landing temporarily as a contractor at The Washington Post.
AmeriCorps beckoned. I was offered (and quickly accepted) the position of a disaster relief coordinator with the American Red Cross of Tennessee, to prepare the rural counties of Coffee, Moore, and Franklin for the event of fires, floods, tornadoes, etc.
I accepted the position at the end of March. It is now the end of April. I have moved out of my group house in the Adams Morgan neighborhood of Washington, DC, and I have returned to Philadelphia for a couple of weeks to prepare for what lies ahead. I have left a great many of my friends. I will soon leave my family, too, to live as a Yankee in the heart of the south, in the small town of Tullahoma, TN.
I've been there once already. I went down for a weekend a couple of weeks ago so I could get the lay of the land and arrange for an apartment. In driving time, Tullahoma is about 45 minutes north of Chattanooga, 90 minutes south of Nashville, and 30 minutes east of Lynchburg (home of the world-famous Jack Daniels distillery.) The tallest man-made structures in town are church steeples, flag poles, and antennae, with no building taller than three stories. There are more churches than I can count.
The major highway between Chattanooga and Nashville is I-24. Running right along side it is US-41, which I have to drive for a few miles through Shelbyville, before turning west toward Tullahoma. On my first visit, it took me only a few moments and the serendipitous tuning of my car stereo's FM dial to realize that I had been driving down the same highway made famous in the Allman Brothers' "Ramblin' Man." I'll conclude my first post with those lyrics.
My father was a gambler down in Georgia
And he wound up on the wrong end of a gun
And I was born in the back seat of a Greyhound bus
Rollin' down Highway Forty One
--
Lord I was born a Ramblin' Man
Tryin' to make a livin' and doin' the best I can
And when it's time for leavin', I hope you understand
That I was born a Ramblin' Man
