Nine Day Hiking and Campus Visit Trip: Part 2, Travel to Lebanon, VA
Antique car show in a strip mall parking lot in rural Virginia; I’m fairly sure the white car was dropping someone off, not part of the show
CEFR Level B2-C1
Friday
Events: Reserve hotel for that night, 10:00 a.m. hair cut, pack car, drive four hours to the Super 8 at Lebanon, VA
Early Friday morning, I reserved a hotel room for that night, selected purely on low price and proximity to The Channels trailhead. A secondary desire was to go somewhere I hadn’t been before, which is partly how I ended up reserving a room in Lebanon, VA.
After my 10:00 a.m. haircut, I came home and rushed through lunch before packing the car, kissing my husband goodbye, and settling in for a long drive while listening to Wuthering Heights.
Even English Speakers Can't Understand Each Other
If you haven’t been to southwest Virginia, it is an area that has a distinct accent. When I checked into the hotel, they needed my email address. I have one I use for cases like this. I designed it to use common words. One of the words is music. I pronounce it /mˈjuzɪk/. The clerk was confused at how to spell what he heard me say.
“Is it m-y-o…”
I interrupted him, “‘Music’ like ‘listen to the music’.” He nodded and I was bemused. That’s the first time someone couldn’t understand what the word was, even if they pronounce it as /muzɪk/. Bonus points to the clerk for guessing the phonetic spelling, though.
After checking in to the Super 8 and verifying that the room was suitably clean, I went in search of a filling supper in a place that wouldn’t be too expensive or too loud.
Supper Time
I ate a burger and fries at Pat’s Kountry Diner. The food was good, but the hamburger had the look and texture of a frozen or pre-formed patty. The waitress was friendly. She seemed to know everyone and quizzed me to be sure she hadn’t forgotten that she knew me. I wondered if she were trying to gather gossip on the new face and I was selective in what I said.
As I looked around the diner and at the people at the antique car show in the parking lot, it occurred to me that I had only seen white people since I arrived in Lebanon. Given the emotional state of the US right now, it made me wonder if it would be safe for a person of color to travel here. Maybe the pray-for-America sticker by the front door put this thought into my head. This is not a comment on the diner, Lebanon, or the area’s residents. It is only an observation from someone who regularly travels with a Black man. It’s an admittance of the thoughts that happen that didn’t occur when I only traveled with white people.
After eating, I went to the hotel and used my laptop to finish some work I hadn’t gotten done during the week. Then I set my alarm for 5:00 a.m. and tried to sleep.