My Redacted Life: Chapter One, (Cont. 2)

Having earned my release from the bondage imposed by the military in general, and the U.S. Navy in particular, I continued my “free-world” journey November 12, 1970 from Starkville, Mississippi.

I loaded my belongings: the old Gibson guitar, a sea-bag containing what I had not donated to shipmates, a plastic container of papers, three additional sets of civilian clothing, and a grocery sack full of books. Everything I owned didn’t fill the back seat of Steinbeck, my beloved 1967 Impala.

How often since have I wished my wife and I could get everything we own into the back seat of a car and take off toward the horizon.

I headed west on U.S. Highway 82 toward Winona, Indianola, and Greenville. It was nice farm country. Our country was yet not fully blemished by interstates. White flight had not devastated some cities and created new ones. Farming still required manual laborers who shopped at local stores. I passed through still-proud downtowns, places that had served white folks proudly and black folks begrudgingly for years. But change would be coming and time wasn’t an ally.

I pressed on. After Winona, I entered the portion of the state that the Flood of 1927 had inundated, although I didn’t know it at the time. That day, dead cotton stalks chattered at me in the cold November wind, wanting to tell me of those dreadful days. If the State of Mississippi shares a collective gift, it exists in the telling of stories. But I wanted nothing of dreadful tales on that second day of my freedom. I wanted joy. How about some stories of happy slaves dancing around those mansions for “Massah”?

Sliding an eight-track cassette of Hello, I’m Johnny Cash, into the slot, and with See Ruby Fall blasting away, I drove on, past Indianola and toward Greenville. Much later in life, I would meet a man from Greenville, now living in Oklahoma. He is a fine man who cooks pastries and takes them to a local nursing home where he paints the toenails of the women there. Mississippi, like all places, produces its share of saints I suppose.

Reaching Greenville that day, I detoured through Downtown and saw the levee where, in 1927, armed troops held African-American farm workers in bondage to prevent their escaping to the north during the confusion of the flood.

Today though, all was wise and wonderful. People milled around as if the past was only a taunting dream. I circled back past the brick buildings and turned right, ready to embark on my future, whatever it should be. The military, with its mixed memories, was fading further and further into its sea-scented but shrouded history.

That's when I saw the Mighty Mississippi.

Farewell to the old me.