Oh, Atlanta, I Hear You Calling, I'm Coming Back To You One Fine Day, No Need To Worry, There Ain't No Hurry, Cause I'm On My Way Back To Georgia

--"Oh Atlanta", Bad Company

The first time I tell anyone my milkshake story it tends to be met with disbelief. Most people assume that the milkshake I was privy to near Monticello was good, but certainly wasn't the best milkshake ever made as I claim it to be. They relegate my assertion to a mixture of fond recollection and my general sense of dramatic exaggeration. No matter my protests I can never fully convince them that my evaluation was and still is a fair assertion of my critical faculties.

While it might be true that in most instances I remain the least unbiased individual on the planet, in many instances that is exactly what I am. Milkshakes, like a great many subject, is a matter of taste so a certain bias does creep into any evaluation of them. However, I am fairly confident that had any of my harshest critics sampled the aforementioned example they would have tasted the unmatched quality like I did that day back in April of '86. Nostalgia does not enter any long-held conviction I still possess regarding my memory on the subject matter nor does my flair for fondness for creative license. That milkshake stands on its own, heads and tails above any other milkshake which has been made before or after it.

When one stops to contemplate it when you critique anything; be it films, food, or novels, there must be examples which stand on either end of the quality spectrum. There always has to be something which exemplifies a particular matter at its best and something which exemplifies something at its worst. Granted, applying the moniker "best ever" or "worst ever" does invite incredulity on the part of spectators, but for everything that is good there has to be everything is evil. For everything that is topnotch there has to be something beneath contempt.

I just happened to find the best example of a milkshake ever poured, plain and simple.

----

That brings me around to the topic of Atlanta. Like that milkshake, it too is something I haven't experienced firsthand in many years. Indeed, coming up this December it will have been sixteen years since I first visited and in April fifteen years since I last visited. And yet I still think of Atlanta as being one of the most charming cities I've ever been to. I'm well aware that every city I've been to in the last twenty years since I started seriously traveling have had their own charms and their own unique selling points. But there's something about the certain Southern city that clinches it for me as being the best example of what a city in that part of the country is supposed to be like. I don't know if it's the people, the history, the architecture, or the general mood of the area, but I still ache to go back one day when I get the whole "agreement" business behind me.

True, part of my affection for the city has to do with the company I kept while I was visiting, but even taking Lucy out of the equation I think Atlanta would remain my top choice for Southern cities one must visit at least once in one's lifetime. I mean--I like Louisville and all. And the gods know I'll never forget my time in the environs of Wheeling, but those places and all the other examples of Southern cities I've been to don't hold a candle to the gem of Georgia. It's like comparing apples (peaches?) and oranges. There are cities in the South and then there's a true Southern city.

That's what Atlanta is to me, a true Southern city.


same old place
it's the same old city
what can I do?
i'm falling in love

Yes, I do possess a bit of nostalgia for it because my visits there did take place during a happier time in my life. And, yes, I could be overblowing how beautiful and, well, majestic everything is there. Every city has its darker corners and every city has its less than photographable areas. Atlanta is no different. I'm not suggesting that every part of Atlanta means as much to me as every other part. What I am suggesting is that the city as a whole means something to me. It means something to me getting a bit of barbecue at one of the places where barbecuing was perfected. It means something to me to be walking down the streets of one of the oldest cities in one of the oldest cities in the United States. It means something to me being around a people who are so polite, helpful, and just plain friendly when put in comparison to the rest of the country. It means something to me to look up at buildings that hold their gravity and memories in every cracked veneer. It means something to me to say I was in one of the most exceptional cities I have ever visited.

I haven't visited every major city in the U.S., though I'm trying to. I haven't even contemplated how much more beauty there is out in the rest of the world. All I can place Atlanta in comparison to are the cities I've already seen. As much as Boston remains my favorite city and where I feel most at home in, Atlanta will always rank right up there in terms of cities I consider eventful. Boston might be old, but I don't consider it to be as graceful, as majestic, as breathtaking as Atlanta. Boston is like the hometown that feels comfortable and safe and inviting, while Atlanta is the City--full of history and spectacle and definition. It's much the same for every other city. They all have their selling points, but Atlanta by virtue of having only seen it the two times holds the key to my heart as being a paradise still not fully explored.

And maybe just like the milkshake it holds so much hope for me because I keep anticipating the day when she and I will be reunited once more.

Yours Swimmingly,
mojo shivers