The Sounds of Savannah—Week 4

As I mentioned before, Savannah is a quintessentially Southern city. Many of its streets and boulevards are lined with large oak trees with branches draped with Spanish moss overhanging the lanes of traffic. It has a unique street pattern of nearly two dozen small city-block-sized parks stretching out for about mile or so from the city center on the Savannah River—the border between Georgia and South Carolina.

These parks provide a restful interlude for anyone walking between historical sites, shops and restaurants in the historic district of Savannah. One would expect these parks to be quiet, with the sounds of chirping birds and the clip-clop of hooves of horse-drawn carriages plying tourists around town.

I picked an AirBnB rental in the middle of the historic district for its location, a 15 minute or less walk from many of the main historic sites. I have a studio apartment in a 100-year-old building and this rental is pretty much what I expected. The building is old, but serviceable, and the accommodations have pretty much met my expectations.

My one problem is, however, the constant noise emanating from the streets surrounding my building. I am on the eighth floor on the east side of the building and there is a 1990s 12-story apartment building directly across the street from me. Based on my observations, these two buildings may be among the tallest in all of Savannah. 

Street noise between our two buildings is amplified by a “canyon-effect” and that has been a source of annoyance. During the day, there is a pretty-much constant rumble of regular traffic from cars, an occasional truck and tour busses. I have no problem with that. 

My issue is with those who drive so-called muscle cars that sound like NASCAR race cars and accelerate with a roar on the streets below. Also, there is an occasional motorcycle or large pickup truck far noisier than conventional vehicles. Add in the noise from sirens on police cars and ambulances, and it gets to be a bit much.

I acknowledge that I am not used to the street noise of the city because I have lived in the suburbs for the last 30 years. And I am willing to accept a lot of this street noise as part of living in the city. As I write this, the bells of nearby St. John Basilica are tolling for the six o’clock Angelus, and I find that sound quite appropriate and beautiful.

Another source of noise are garbage trucks that patrol the city well before dawn and pick up the refuse from nearby hotels and apartment buildings including mine. Very early in the morning there is a lot of noise with the clanging of the metal as large dumpsters are picked up and emptied and the beeping sounds as a truck backs up away from the dumpster. Most of the time this noise starts between 6 and 6:30AM, but one morning I was awakened by the clanging and beeping at 4:20AM!

Now to the good stuff. One of the nicest aspects of the neighborhood is that there is small bookstore on my block that has a wide selection of used paperbacks. I needed it last week because the weather in the middle of the week was cool and wet. The small store has is jammed with books and most of the paperbacks are $2.50 and up. I’ve read a couple of international intrigue books by David Baldacci and mysteries by Dean Koontz and James Patterson. 

I wanted to hole up in a coffee shop and read or write during these rainy days, but most were too crowded to find a seat. Once the weather broke, I headed for nearby Madison Square to read and enjoyed some people watching. Two city employees were there with leaf blowers cleaning off the sidewalks, but they were gone in about 15 minutes. 

After a while, I was hungry and walked a couple of blocks to a sandwich shop called “Anita Deli Sandwich.” I love puns and this one will remain high on my list of favorites. The roast beef, cheddar with carmelized onions on a sandwich sandwich was delicious It was so big I took half of it back to my apartment for later.

As I walked back through Madison Square, I noticed a work crew arranging several dozen white wooden folding chairs in rows in one corner of the park for, I presume, a wedding. The sunny and pleasant weather and the beautiful park would be a nice change from a conventional church wedding I thought.

There is a contemporary looking hotel down the block from me that has a rooftop swimming pool and a couple of rooftop patios. Later that afternoon, I saw a bunch of people in suits and dresses gathered on one of the patios for another wedding. It looked like a swanky affair (rooms at this hotel start at about $400 a night!) with about 100 people in attendance. After the ceremony, people gathered inside and a band played until almost midnight.

The rest of the weekend is kind of a blur as I read, watched hoops and walked about town. The streets were still crowded on the weekend, but nothing like the weekend after St. Patrick’s Day.

On Monday, I headed to Tybee Island for a couple of hours of beach time. It was sunny and about 70, but the wind was very chilly and I was glad to get back to my warm car for the ride home.

I’ll have more in my last Savannah blog in a week or so.

 

Savannah's St. Patrick's Day Party-Week Three

“Turn out the lights, the party’s over…”

—sung by Willie Nelson and also by Don Meredith on “Monday Night Football”

I decided to delay my third blog until the end of the weekend because of Savannah’s annual St. Patrick’s Day celebration which began on Wednesday night and didn’t seem to end until Sunday. More about that in a minute.

My third week in Savannah began with a couple of cloudy and very cool days. Overnight low temperatures were in the 20s the previous weekend, so I spent most of the evenings indoors watching college basketball conference tournaments. 

On Sunday afternoon, as I read a book in Chippewa Square, I had a very pleasant surprise. At the other end of the square, I heard someone announce the playing of a recording of the national anthem of Ukraine in solidarity with that country under attack from Russia.

I walked over to see what was happening and found that members of the Savannah Philharmonic were beginning a concert. A group of about a dozen orchestra players and chorus members proceeded to perform a free hour-long set of Broadway show selections for a crowd of several hundred spectators. The singers and musicians were very good and the crowd was very appreciative.

I was sorry Pam missed this because a soloist sang “Summertime” and that is one of Pam’s favorite songs. 

Pam arrived Tuesday night and we spent Wednesday sightseeing. On Thursday morning, we walked a couple of blocks over to Oglethorpe Street to watch Savannah’s St. Patrick’s Day Parade that has been held since 1804. 

It wasn’t held the last two years because of Covid restrictions and officials estimated that about 400,000 people viewed the parade. It was well over two hours and featured several bagpipe and drum corps, high school bands, floats and more. My AirBnB apartment was near the parade route and my aching back and legs led me to return to my apartment before the parade ended.

There is a bar about a block from my apartment and a couple of other open-air restaurants nearby. For four days, there was almost continuous music from mid- morning until well past midnight. If I were in my 20s, I would have gladly joined in the partying. But, I am older than that (by a lot!) and the noise and music were too much.

So, the day after St. Patrick’s Day, Pam and I decided to head for the beach at Tybee Island, which is normally about a half-hour away. But, the drive out there took over an hour because of heavy traffic and an accident on the main highway to the beach. After cruising through the beach parking lot twice, I was able to get a parking spot and Pam and I headed for the beach. 

We were there close to an hour and a half, but thick clouds rolled in and I noticed the sky to the west was very dark. I looked at weather radar on my phone and figured the storm would hit about 5PM. We made it to the car with a few minutes to spare and headed back to Savannah. 

On Saturday, we got a welcome respite from the noise and heat when we attended a Bach marathon at Ascension Lutheran Church across from Wright Square. The event was scheduled to last from 11AM until 4PM and we listened for about two hours. Many of the players were under 17 and some were very good.

Revelers are allowed to carry alcoholic drinks outside in the historic district of central Savannah and St. Patrick’s day and the next couple of days resembled a cross between Mardi Gras and a SEC football pre-game tailgate party. After the concert on Saturday, Pam and I went down to the Riverwalk area along the Savannah River and observed thousands green-clad revelers imbibing under the watchful eyes of Savannah’s PD and Chatham County Sheriff deputies.

The sidewalk and park were jammed with thousands of people, many carrying plastic cups with their favorite beverage. There were long lines outside a couple of bars and a continuous stream of cars and pickup trucks—with windows open and music blaring—snaked their way down the cobble stone street. It was, in the words of my late mother, “…a seething madhouse.”

Things finally began to calm down on Sunday and we decided to drive up to Beaufort, SC, a charming coastal town about an hour north of Savannah. We ate lunch at a bar cafe that featured numerous types of tacos—shrimp for me and ahi tuna for Pam— and then spent the rest of the afternoon hanging out at a wonderful park on the bay. The skies were clear and there was a mild, cool breeze coming off the water.

The relaxing afternoon was the perfect way to end this noisy and chaotic week.

  

Savannah Sabbatical--Week Two

My first week in Savannah ended with a cool and windy Friday. I had thought about going to the beach, but the weather made me decide to wait. Instead I went to a local coffee shop and spent time people watching from a table outside. March is a huge tourism month here and the crowds on Bull Street reflected that. 

Most of the tourists were white, middle-aged couples who spend time strolling Savannah’s distinctive squares in the central historic district, touring historic homes and visiting gift shops. There were also a fair number of students from SCAD, the Savannah College of Art and Design, that borders the historic district.

There are some pretty eccentric people here. While sitting outside the coffee shop, one 50-ish guy went by on a segue and shouted “Happy Friday!” Most of the people on the sidewalks waved or yelled back at him. Because I am retired, Friday no longer has the cachet it once had, but I know it is still important to those still in career mode. A little while later, a 40-ish woman walked down the sidewalk and was urging everyone who is “unknown’ to join her group. I have no idea what she meant, but it added to the slightly bizarre nature of this area.

My wife Pam and I first visited Savannah in the late 1970s, when we decide to stop during the return home after visiting my parents who were living in Florida. We were impressed by the stunning beauty of the numerous parks on squares throughout the historic district. There was a charming, antebellum quality of the city that impressed us. We visited the city a few times since, most recently in 2016 when we enjoyed the annual Home and Gardens Tour and an evening carriage ride through the historic area.

I came down here alone this time and I am less impressed than I was in the past. That may partly be the because I am staying in the middle of the historic district, where there is more traffic and noise, especially during the daylight hours. Each weekday morning, I’ve been awakened at around 6:30AM by the sound of garbage trucks emptying trash dumpsters. There are several nightclubs and hotels in the area, and I’ve heard music from bands playing until well past midnight. I like the convenient location of the AirBnB that I rented, but the downside is that it is definitely noisier.

The crowds on the streets Saturday were unbelievable. It was like a Yesterday Land at Disney World. The closest coffee shop had a line out the front door and the parks in the squares were jammed with tourists. The odd counterpoint to this were the homeless people in a couple of the squares I visited who were sitting or lying on the benches oblivious to the commotion. The noise on the streets was much worse than I had encountered before in Savannah because of numerous very loud motorcycles and monster trucks speeding down the streets.

Sunday I decided to drive to Hilton Head Island, SC, which is about an hour away and visit Coligny State Park which has a giant parking area near the beach. I never made it to the beach because the parking area was packed and there were dozens of cars patrolling the lots seeking an available space. I tried another beach access area, but the story was much the same. Apparently, thousands of others also decided to take advantage of the 80-degree temperatures and blue skies to hit the beach.

I headed back to Savannah and enjoyed the rest of the day on the comfort of my balcony with an ample supply of Bourbon.

Monday, it was less crowded so I took a long walk through several blocks to Boughton Street and then turned back towards my apartment. I sat on the balcony and read another book. About 4:30PM, I noticed another young women in the Drayton Tower across the street undressing in front of the window. This was the second time during my visit I had seen this happen. My new take on the old saying is: “People who live in glass houses need to remember when to close the blinds.”

Monday night, I went to restaurant that was only a block from my apartment. It’s called the Six Pence and I had a good meal of “Bangers and Mash” which is sausage links and mashed potatoes with gravy with a serving of green beans. The meal was very tasty.

Tuesday began with a very thick layer of fog and clouds when I awoke at 6:30AM to the noise of the garbage trucks making the rounds. I had morning coffee and breakfast and decided to go to Chippewa Square and read. I found another place to get iced coffee and I read my book and occasionally looked up at the tourists and students from the nearby Savannah College of Art and Design (SCAD). It was about noon and the sun came out and it was comfortably warm. The weather for the rest of the week was questionable, so I decided to go back to the apartment and gather my stuff to head to the beach.

Tybee Island is about a half-hour east of Savannah and I arrived a little after 1PM.  As you enter town a sign says that all visitor parking is only available on pay parking lots. I found a lot near the main beach and paid my $7 for two hours and headed out onto the sand. The sun was bright and breeze was a bit cool, but it was a very enjoyable couple of hours. On the drive back to Savannah, I was stopped at a railroad crossing for 20-30 minutes before arriving at my apartment.

Wednesday and Thursday were fairly uneventful and the skies were mostly cloudy with a chance of rain. I spent a lot of time watching college basketball games in conference tournaments. Wednesday for lunch, I visited Clary’s, a longtime Savannah traditional diner that was prominently mentioned in the book and movie based here called “Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil.” 

I went for a couple of short walks and made a trip to the grocery store on Thursday, but did not do much else, That night, I went dinner at Hitch, a bar across the street. I had chicken pot pie filling in a large burrito and was topped with a unique recipe for pico de gallo that was mostly collard greens in a sweet and sour base. It was really delicious.

I will be back again with more next time.

  

 

 

The Savannah Apartment-Week One

I arrived in Savannah, GA, on Tuesday March 1, after a 700-mile trip from Stow that I stretched into two days. I arrived in mid-afternoon and followed directions for parking and getting the key to the AirBnB rental I have booked for about five weeks. The studio apartment is in an eight-story brick building that is about 100 years old and located in Savannah’s historic district. 

I picked the unit because of its location within walking distance of the historic sites and attractive parks that dot this part of town. The closest park is Chippewa Square which features a statue of George Oglethorpe, the founder of the Georgia colony. It was the location in the film “Forrest Gump” where Gump sat on a park bench and said the film’s most iconic line: “Life is like a box of chocolates…” So many tourists wanted to take pictures at that bench that traffic was impeded and the city eventually removed the bench and placed it in a museum. 

Another feature I like is that there is a decent size balcony that has a great view of downtown Savannah and the historic district. However, some of the view is blocked by a 12-story apartment building that is directly across the street. This newer, modern-looking structure is made of gray stone with large glass windows and it seems architecturally inconsistent with rest of the 18th and 19th century structures in the area.

I am not a voyeur, but the large windows provide a good view inside some of the apartments, especially at night. I haven’t seen any crimes or murders a’la Hitchcock’s film “Rear Window”, but some residents—the majority of them female— might be more careful about what they do or wear while in front of these large windows. Just saying…

So far, I’ve just been getting settled into the apartment and getting to know the surrounding area. The streets are lined with large oak trees with lots of Spanish moss hanging from the limbs. It is still early spring, but I’ve seen some pink azaleas blooming on the boulevards. 

On Wednesday, I decided to get a good brunch and I wound up at the Collins Corner Cafe. I had a delicious meal of sausage gravy over poached eggs and biscuits, chicken sausage links and fennel slaw. From my table on the sidewalk, I could observe the horse-drawn carriages and tour busses going by as well as multitudes of tourists on foot. It was a very pleasant, sunny day and a wonderful experience. When it came time to pay my check, I told my waiter to notice the last name on my credit card, and he asked me if he could get a raise. Couldn’t give him a raise, but I did give him a nice tip. 

Then I had nice walk back to my apartment and spent the sunny and warm afternoon on the balcony reading a book that Pam had bought and recommended. It’s called “Spymistress” by William Stevenson and chronicles the tale of Vera Atkins who was one of Great Britain’s most prominent spies before and during World War II. One of her colleagues in the British intelligence system was Ian Fleming who said Atkins was an inspiration for his character James Bond. Fleming later recounted that when he was at a dinner with Atkins, she ordered a Martini with Booth Gin, very little Vermouth, a twist of lime and wanted it “...shaken, not stirred.”

After two warm sunny days, I thought about going to the beach on Friday. However, the weather turned considerably cooler and it was cloudy so I found a nearby coffee shop and read and did some people watching. March is a very big tourism month here as the spring-like weather attracts large numbers of “snowbird” tourists. Most of the visitors I saw were couples in their 40s and up and a surprising number of groups of only women. 

The major event in March in Savannah is the annual St. Patrick’s Day parade which draws tens of thousands of visitors and is billed as one of the largest in the country. Later in the month, there is a significant home and garden tour in the historic district that draws thousands of visitors. It wasn’t held in both 2020 and 2021 because of the Covid pandemic, but the website said the tour will be back on this year.

My last two sabbaticals in El Paso and Las Vegas were in the dry, desert-like southwest. The low country of the southeast coast couldn’t be more different. So I plan to share more experiences in my next blog, so stay tuned.   

The "Post-COVID" Summer

It’s been a while since I posted anything to my blog—about five months—so I think it’s about time for me to update what’s been happening these last few months. 

Pam, our son Brian (both Pfizer) and me (Moderna) were vaccinated in late February and late March, so by mid-April we were ready to emerge from the self-quarantine cocoon that had lasted over a year.

In mid-April my monthly poker group resumed with all of us vaccinated and it was great to exchange stories between hands about how we survived 2020 and our plans for this summer. A couple of the guys planned to meet with their kids, spouses and grandchildren at the beach during the summer. Several of my friends were booked on a train trip sponsored by AAA through the Rockies, but that was cancelled in June.

Pam and I had planned to go to Europe in 2020 for our 50^th Anniversary, but the pandemic blew away that trip. This summer, we discussed a trip to Hawaii, but that state still had travel restrictions for most of the summer. We then planned a trip to New England in mid-July, but a couple of intense downpours cancelled those plans.

Our 22-year-old roof had a serious leak at the rear of our house. We got estimates from several roofing contractors and had the roof replaced two weeks ago. so that was the end of significant trip this summer. We also decided to replace our 11-year-old water heater. Our 41-year-old house is entering its third repair and replacement cycle and we replaced all of our windows last December.  We have decided to defer any significant trip to 2022. 

We have been able to do some good things this summer including attending a few concerts at Blossom. I’ve gone to six Akron Rubberducks games with my friends. Pam and I have gone to the beach at Vermilion on Lake Erie twice and we’ll to go up there again before the fall weather begins.

And that won’t be long. We’ve noticed that sunset is about 45 minutes earlier than it was on the Summer Solstice on June 21. The leaves on the red maples in our back yard are beginning to turn brown—these are the first to go—and I’ve noticed some leaves on other trees starting to lose their green color.

It has been very warm and humid for the past couple of weeks, but the nights seem a bit cooler, so I know that fall is not too far away. Our lawn cutting service has skipped cutting a couple of weeks in the last month as the growth rate of our lawn slows down.

I was hoping for a more significant emergence from the pandemic this summer, but the distressing increase in cases in recent weeks indicates that this fall will bring more restrictions as the unmasked and unvaccinated get infected with the Delta variant. 

I’m not going to say much about masks and vaccines, but in the last week or two, I’ve begun to wear my mask again when I enter a store. I’m over 70 and have several risk factors from COVID-19. But, I also recognize that my vaccine protects me from getting ill or protects me from getting seriously ill if I am exposed to COVID-19.

So, we will muddle through somehow. Pam will be teaching an accounting class online again this fall at the University of Akron and I will be taking an acting class at the Beck Center in Lakewood and taking a couple of non-credit courses online.

I’m also beginning to think about where I will take a winter sabbatical in early 2022, but I am concerned about the re-emergence of COVID in the southwestern states I am considering.

So, it remains a time of great uncertainty. I hope the next wave of COVID doesn’t affect my plans as much as in the past. But, the virus will never go away until the appropriate number of people get vaccinated. And we aren’t nearly there yet.

 

 

Exiting COVID-19

It’s been almost exactly one year since I joined millions of Americans in a self-imposed quarantine to protect ourselves from the COVID-19 pandemic that is particularly dangerous for older people. For the last year, I have mostly stayed at home except for the two or three times a week when I would go out for a drive or my once a week trek to the liquor store. The only other time I have been going out is to a parking lot service at our church on Sunday mornings.

But, there is hope for a return to normalcy in the next few weeks. First, spring is approaching and the first crocuses have bloomed in our front yard and the high temperature is forecast to be in the low 60s for the next few days. 

Second, as I write this I got my first COVID-19 vaccination shot about 10 days ago and will get the second in about two and a half weeks. When I add two weeks for the vaccine to reach full efficacy, I expect to be ready to get out and resume some normal activities by mid-April. 

Our minor league baseball team the Class AA Akron Rubberducks will open their season on May 4 and my group has ticket vouchers from last year that will be good this season. My monthly poker group has decided to get together again after a 14-month hiatus on April 16 assuming everyone is fully-vaccinated by then. And, I’m awaiting an announcement about the summer schedule for the Cleveland Orchestra at Blossom Music Center.

All of these activities were cancelled last summer and am really looking forward to them this summer. I’m also looking forward to going the nearby pharmacy where I usually purchase hearing aid batteries, disposable razor blades, allergy medicine and other things that I have had have my son Brian get for me this past year.

I’m looking forward to visiting my barber Margie for a professional haircut and good conversation about her two daughters who are both in media. One is a production assistant for ESPN in Los Angeles and the other is editor of a small-town weekly newspaper in Mississippi. My wife has been cutting my hair for the past year and I am grateful for the work she does, but Margie the barber does a better job with my hair than my wife the CPA.

I’m looking forward to hanging out at a coffee shop with a friend or my laptop on a cloudy, drizzly day. I want to take a car trip later this spring, but I will be careful to avoid any place that is too crowded or is a state where the governor has eliminated a mandate for wearing a mask. I want to visit the Rock Hall and the Cleveland Museum of Art. 

When the weather warms, I want to head for the beach. I want to have a sit-down meal in a good restaurant, something I haven’t done in about a year.

But, most of all, I want to be able to get together with family and friends and exchange hugs and handshakes. Earlier today, I read an article about seven adverse effects of quarantine on mental health and my dangerous spots were having a little too much Bourbon some days and occasionally blowing up in anger at the news on TV. Thankfully, I’ve already cut back on one and will cut back on the other once I get my second vaccine dose.

A couple of weeks ago a dear friend from our church succumbed to COVID-19 after a two-month struggle. He is survived by his wife of 41 years, three children and four grand children. More than half a million Americans have died in the last year from the disease and they are survived by millions of family, friends and co-workers. This has been a horrible experience for the country and here’s hoping it can be committed to history by the end of this year.

On a positive note, I feel a sense of renewal is coming. In the past few months, three new families have moved on to our street, each with young children. Yesterday afternoon, two kids who live next door got off the school bus and their mom waved at the bus driver and hugged her kids. I admit it gave me goose bumps to see something so normal, yet so beautiful.

I believe the quarantine and pandemic have made me stop and appreciate the little things more: the bright sunshine, the crocuses blooming, the chirping of birds—all ordinary things that make me think will get through this trial. And that can’t come a moment too soon.

 

Rejection Letters

I am still self-quarantining because of COVID-19, so I decided to try to clean up my home office and get rid of files and papers I don’t need anymore. As I went through my file cabinet drawers, I found a two folders containing rejection letters I had received over the years after applying for various jobs in Public TV, video production and journalism.

Including the rejection letters, my cover letters and initial job listings, both folders were a couple of inches thick. The documents covered the dates from the late 1970s to the late 1990s. After that, job searching moved online meaning fewer paper rejection letters.

As I sorted through the papers and put most of them in a bag to be recycled, I did retain a few letters from people I knew through mutual acquaintances or who had worked at someplace where I had worked. Most of the job listings came from two sources: “Broadcasting” magazine’s weekly classified listing of positions available and the job search service of the National Association of Broadcasters. It was through a listing in the now-defunct NAEB that I came to work at the University of Akron in 1975.

I also was a member of the International Television Association during the 1980s and 1990s, a group composed of mostly corporate and educational video production professionals. That organization also had a job listing service for members.

During the late 70s and 1980s, I concentrated on positions in the Southeastern US because I wanted get away from the brutal winter weather in Northeast Ohio. In 1990 enrollment at UA began to fall due to a decline in the number of high school graduates in the region. I sensed that the university might eventually close my department for budgetary reasons and that happened in 1995.

In the early 1990s, I began to cast a wider net and apply for positions all over the country. I got some serious nibbles from employers in Florida, Tennessee, the Carolinas and even Washington state. I also interviewed for positions in Northeast Ohio, but there were no offers. 

Early in my career, I was dedicated to the concept of television as a source of good for the audience through my work in Public TV and educational video. I believed in the programming philosophy of public television to inform and entertain. I hoped to get a program director’s position at a PBS affiliate, but that never happened.

After UA closed the TV Center in 1995, I decided to repurpose my career away from video production. I was a reporter for Sun Newspapers, the chain of weekly papers serving suburbs of Cleveland and for Tire Business a Crain Communications publication. Both jobs allowed me to improve my writing skills and learn more about local government and business. I remain grateful to the editors and co-workers who helped me learn a new career. 

Then in 2001 I returned to UA as a multimedia specialist and remained there until I retired in 2011.

Looking through the stack of rejection letters was humbling, but it also made me feel relieved. I am so glad I don’t have to go through the apprehension and disappointment of searching for a job anymore. During all the decades of job searching, I discovered that often it wasn’t necessarily what you knew as much as who you knew. In six of the eight full-time jobs I had during my career, I knew someone who knew someone about the job opening that I was applying for.

Some of the rejection letters ended with the phrase: “Best of luck in your future endeavors.” I’m so glad I don’t have to read that anymore.