Good morning, y’all. Spring seems to have returned once again to the mountains. I am happy to report with the advent of warmer, drier temperatures, my congestion has disappeared. Once medication started, the end was near. One day I’m sounding all the world like a wolf caught in a trap, and the next I can hit “C” over “C”. Now, I can’t hold the note for long without my voice cracking, but at least I can hit a note again. I’ll have to let Axel Rhodes know that I’m ready to rejoin the “TackyOnes” in my role as lead singer.
Speaking of rejoining things, I don’t know who is more interested in me rejoining society at large, me or Mulva. The perspective is way different, I can think of a hundred things I want to do, Mulva can think of a hundred things she wants me to do. Those two lists create a very small Venn diagram of things where what I’d want, or be willing to do, overlaps the things that Mulva expects, or wants me to do. In trying to sort through the “things we could do” list for a mutually satisfying adventure, we struck a bargain over visiting the new home of The Full Gospel Original Church of God in Blairsville.
I have not seen the inside of the church in person. The “Crystal Palace” was something of an anomaly in Blairsville. It was “overbuilt” by the Mormons as they anticipated a huge following of mountain folk to throw away their centuries old beliefs and superstitions in favor of the Mormon’s new fangled system. Imagine the Mormon’s surprise when the “grand opening” coincided so closely with the “grand closing”. A church that was built to house hundreds in “Christian comfort”, never held a hundred people at a service. Eventually the Mormons realized that heating and cooling the building were only making their losses worse, and they moved the congregation to a trailer. The “Crystal Palace” has been on the market every since.
The congregation’s open house yesterday had whetted my appetite for seeing what was really going on at the new location. Watching something on TV is very different than seeing something with your own two eyes. I wanted to see if just the very structure itself could invoke a bond to a higher power. I have seen churches in Europe that brought about an emotional reaction from their beauty and presence. I needed to see for myself if the “Crystal Palace” felt, I don’t know, holy? I mean there is a choice to be made here. If I am to return to the fold, and start the ritual of church-going again, shouldn’t it be to a place that I connect to? I know how I feel about “The Little Church In The Valley”. Now I was on a pilgrimage to dowse for feelings at the new location.
We drove past by the “Sugar Hill Cemetery”, where Daddy is buried. I could see from the car that there was a funeral taking place, which was very odd. Who gets buried on a Monday? I’m guessing some long lost relative couldn’t get back for a weekend service and the funeral directors, “Diggum and Fergettum” were going to accommodate the family with a non-peak time. Maybe even non-peak pricing. “Diggum and Fergettum” had been very accommodating with Daddy’s wishes. They left the price tags on Daddy’s burial suit so that we could return it after the service. I told you all, Daddy was cheap, and he didn’t want to invest any money in a suit he was only going to wear one time, even if it was throughout eternity. Besides, he put it in the will, we had to do it.
Along the way we passed the “Boobie Bungalow“, site of yesterday’s impromptu sermon. I asked Mulva for any feedback on the situation, and she kind of hemmed and hawed the way she does when she has “insider info”. I figured that whatever it was that Mulva was mulling over would eventually come out, so I let it go. No point in spoiling our outing by asking her to violate her sacred oath. The one thing you can be sure that will get told and retold is a secret, so I’d just bide my time.
We past through town, and then, there we were at the new home of the Full Gospel Original Church of God. I’ll be giving more details later.