History Girl: Art for the Living, Art for the Dead

Oh my! What a day!

The day got off to a rocky start, with Heidi being sick through the night. Yvette was up--early, as usual--and ventured off to spend an enjoyable day with her Georgia kin. Maddie, Heidi, and I--as usual--slept late. We finally got up, dressed, and into our rented red Chevy Malibu, while Siri provided directions toward Atlanta's High Museum of Art.

I had read about the High online and had perused its web page. Never did I bother to notice what traveling exhibit was currently in display. Can you believe it? It was Vemeer's Girl with a Pearl Earring! That piece, along with several others by various Dutch Masters, are traveling the United States, and apparently will leave Atlanta in September to go to San Francisco for a show at the DeYoung.

Needless to say, I was over the moon.

The girls are gearing up for great art--touching an eyeball for good luck

While strolling through the Dutch paintings on my way to the Vermeer, I did meet a nice man who had brought his little son with him to the exhibit. We saw them on the elevator and then again while looking at a wonderful piece that showed a domestic scene with parents, children, and what looked to be Drunk Uncle from Saturday Night Live. The man told me that this was his favorite piece in the exhibit, and then began to explain the painting for me in the most wonderful detail. He liked the piece because it showed that the children were trying to behave in the ways of the adults, a lesson that our children are always influenced by our actions.

Speaking of children influenced by our actions, I was startled while waiting in line for tickets by Maddie making a reference to "Hoover flags." Now, I thought this must be some reference to contemporary slang, but Maddie was quick to disoblige me of my wrongheaded notion. "Hoover flags," pockets being turned inside out, arose as a symbol of pennilessness during the Great Depression. You wore your "Hoover flags" to show that beggers need not ask you for money as you had none to give. How on earth did Maddie, and Heidi as well, know this but I didn't? CSUS, maybe you're not giving me the education I need!

Anyway, back to the Museum. The Girl with the Pearl Earring was lovely, just as she is in all her reproductions. She's small, like the Mona Lisa, but there is certainly something bewitching about her enigmatic look that also recalls the Mona Lisa.

See what I mean? Bewitching....

The rest of the museum was very nice, but paled a little when compared with the Huntington which the girls and I visited in July. There were a few pieces by famous artists--Monet, Renoir, John Singer Sargeant, etc.--but not much. Still, it was well worth the visit.

Maddie wants some new furniture

So do I

While the girls and I were basking in art, Yvette was basking in the glow on kinship, attending church services with her family this morning and singing along with the hymns. She spoke to her cousins about the African-American thoughts on Stone Mountain, and their insights have really got me thinking. One cousin says she goes to Stone Mountain every year--it is her land, too. Born here in Atlanta, she will not give up her right to go where she pleases. I like the attitude--the bad guys only win when the good guys do nothing. Yet another cousin also remembers that, when he was a child, blacks did not go near Stone Mountain. That was still a KKK site, and any non-white was well advised to steer clear. Now, as we saw yesterday, there are families of every color in attendance. In addition, many of the staff at Stone Mountain were African-American, refusing to lose out on an employment opportunity just because some rednecks used to think of the rock as their own.

Anyway, back to our day. The next stop for the girls and I was the Oakland Cemetery, Atlanta's biggest cemetery and home to hundreds of Confederate soldiers who died during the Civil War.

We came here to pay homage to Margaret Mitchell, finding her buried alongside her husband, John Marsh, and behind her parents, Eugene and Maybelle Mitchell.

The parents of the great Margaret Mitchell

I'm communing with the great Margaret herself (through
my ass, apparently)

A quick trip to the cemetery office led to a visit with the nice lady working there, the purchase of a book about the cemetery for me, and a gargoyle candlestick holder for Maddie--very cool for both of us.

Then, now armed with a map, Maddie and I took off for a jaunt around the cemetery, while Heidi and her sour tummy went to snooze for a while in the car. Maddie and I walked past several interesting markers, including the ones below.

Here is the final resting spot for one Sam Venable; Sam
owned the property at Stone Mountain and it was he who
lent it to the KKK for their rituals. He has a lot to answer
for in the afterlife.

Maddie takes a look at the hundreds of dead Confederate soldiers

It is unclear whether this lion, honoring the unknown
Confederate war dead, is sleeping on top of the Stars and
Bars of dying on top of it.

General John Brown Gordon was one of Lee's trusted colleagues;
where he might have been tried for treason, he was instead
elected to both govenor and senator positions in the "reedemed"
Georgia

Another memorial honoring the Confederate dead

But, out of all that we saw in the Oakland cemetery, the grave of one Mr. Jasper Newton Smith, a building contractor and one-time city councilman, was my favorite.

Can you see him? He's sitting on the roof of his mausoleum,
welcoming his guests. Tricia, we might be able to arrange
something like this for you, when your time comes

After a wonderful look around the cemetery, it was back to the hotel for the girls and I. Practical matters like laundry had to be attended to. Yvette got back from her family visit, and it was time for our last happy hour here in Atlanta.