2001-06-05
The trip to NC, posted at 10:36 p.m.
Epiphany in Baltimore has moved to epiphanyinbaltimore.blogspot.com Here's how the trip went:On Tuesday, I call up Jason and say, "Hey, wanna go to North Carolina this weekend?". He does. Cool. On Thursday at around 3pm, I left Lansing. I picked up Jason on the corner of US-127 and US-12, then headed straight down to Charlotte. We arrived at around 4am in Charlotte, after taking 77 down all the way. We got a hotel room in Charlotte.
In Charlotte, I had my interview at Harding University High School , which went pretty well. It's an interesting school - ranked #30th most challenging high school in the U.S. - and I'm not sure how well I'd fit. I'm all about the underprivelaged student, as you well know - the students who don't have anyone in their corners. And they have 90-minute class periods, which is not something I'd necessarily enjoy I don't think. On the other hand, the principal was an MSU alum, and there are five teachers at the school from Michigan. The school, despite being built in the 1960's, was beautiful - with the California style architecture made famous by the latest school shooting in California (big open campus in the middle, covered walkways in between the outside buildings). The interview went okay, but not outstandingly. And the school wore the fact that North Carolina tests its students more than any other state in the Union as a badge of honor. Ugh. So I've got a lot of dissonance about it. If they called me up and offered me the job tomorrow, I have no idea what I'd say. Probably no.
Part of the reason for that is because I discovered Richmond, VA on the way home. But more on that later.
After the interview, Jason and I went to a flashy-looking bar in downtown Charlotte. Sitting at the bar with our maps in our hands, we were obvious out-of-towners. The bartender came over, and it turns out by strange coincidence that he's from East Lansing too. He used to work at Rum Runner's and Damon's here, and moved to Charlotte with his girlfriend not too long before. The guy schmoozed us for a while, way overselling Charlotte to us. (For example, he told us it was a very clean city, and the headline in the newspaper that day was proclaiming the air on Charlotte some of the worst in the nation.) But he was nice nonetheless. Even if he bemoaned the fact that it's really tough to score good dope in the city.
After the bar, Jason and I set off for Chapel Hill, where my aunt lives. She's actually my great aunt, the wife of my grandma's brother. I do (did) not know her very well, but she and my Uncle Jerry have two kids around my age, she is a high school french teacher, and has always been a very interesting person to speak with at family gatherings. The last time I had seen her was when my Uncle Wayne died in 1997-ish. Even though she never knew my sister or I very well, she always sent us gift certificates to Barnes & Nobles every Christmas our whole lives. When she heard I was thinking about North Carolina in the job search, she insisted I stay with her.
We arrived at Aunt Pam's on Friday night at around 8pm. She was out at a play, and left her door unlocked. She lives in an impossibly beautiful home - like a movie set almost. (Uncle Jerry is currently away on business). Jason and I made ourselves as home, as she had asked, checking our e-mail, cooking the frozen pizza she had left, and watching both "Best of Show" and "Billy Elliot" on the DVD player. She came in around midnight and baked us cookies. Her hospitality and genuine niceness and thoughtfulness remained throughout our visit. I am amazed at the thoughtfulness of some people.
Aunt Pam showed us around Chapel Hill on Saturday, where I was lucky enough to see the flier for the John Mayer show that I wrote about in my last entry. Aunt Pam was a wonderful host and travelguide. She and her family have lived such an interesting life - he is a high-paid auditor, and the family has lived in France, Japan, Connecticut, California, and now North Carolina. Both her kids are out of college, and I got to hear lots of stories about them over the weekend. Especially interested was hearing about Andy, who she dubs her "little freak boy". He really sounds like an interesting character, and I wish I had met him more than twice in my life. He is now living it up in Thailand, living on $5 a day and going to the beach every day. He saved up $3000 and just went there, and is in the process of backpacking around the world. Not only does he have his nipples pierced, but he he also has his penis pierced. Aunt Pam let us know that while we were eating waffles on Sunday morning. "By the way, Andy has his penis pierced. Will you please pass the syrup?". Okay, so there was a context (Andy's nipple ring got caught the day before in a volleyball net, and it ripped out). But Jason and I chuckled at her frankness. Anyhow, the whole family seems neat. I wish I had gotten to know them sooner.
On Sunday, Jason and I travelled to the Raleigh-Durham area. We weren't too impressed with it, which is why I decided to cancel my interview with a Raleigh high school principal on Monday. The area was nice enough, but too much like Lansing. And we visited a state park, and even that wasn't that nice. If they can't even make their state parks look wonderful, then what chance does it have of being a cool city? To be fair, we probably didn't see all of what Raleigh offers. But what I saw reminded me of Lansing/Grand Rapids - lots of spread-out malls and such and not much of a downtown.
Jason and I also sort of made the decision that it would be cooler to be near the ocean. Raleigh-Durham is a good 2-3 hours from the coast, and Charlotte is even farther. While we don't want to be right on the ocean necessarily, we would like to be within an hour.
That night (Sunday), we decided to check out Richmond. Not knowing much of anything about the city, and just liking its location near D.C., the ocean, and the mountains, we decided to leave that night and head to Richmond to spend the night. We'd look around the city in the morning, I'd see about teaching jobs, and then we'd return home for both of us to work on Tuesday.
I e-mailed the principal in Raleigh at Millbrook High School and cancelled my interview, telling him I had to return to Michigan sooner than expected. We waited for Aunt Pam to return from the birthday party of her grandkids (if you're keeping score, they would be my step-4th cousins), bid her adieu, and left for Richmond.
Richmond was only about three hours from Chapel Hill. We stopped at a Denny's, where I began looking at a brochure for the Chesapeake Bay Tunnel. The brochure had a map on it, and it seemed that Virginia Beach was just a bit farther than Richmond. We made the decision to spend the night in that area (since being near the ocean is a factor in our decision, we figured we should see it at least) instead, and spent the night in Norfolk. We drove to the coast that night. On the way, almost spookily, we heard an ad for the Richmond School District, who are looking for hundreds of qualified teachers. A good sign. We briefly checked out Virginia Beach in the morning, then drove to Richmond.
To make a long story short, we loved the city of Richmond. Granted, we only drove through it, but its San Francisco-like hills, its plethora of different neighborhoods, its college campus, and what looked to be a lot to do made us pretty excited about the possibilities of living there. I applied on-line today, although there are other parts of the application I need to fill out.
We drove home all night, switching back and forth. The most direct route from Richmond was a highway called 250, and the map showed a diagonal traverse across Virginia, West Virginia, and Ohio until we got to Michigan. Little did we know that 250 went up and down the mountains - it was beautiful, but hell to drive, especially since we were in a rush. We finally got back to Michigan at around 5am, and I still haven't slept.
Just a note - I feel pretty lucky right now to have Jason as a friend. There are not a whole lot of people with whom I could stand to travel 2,200 miles with over a weekend, as well as spend pretty much every waking and sleeping moment with. I feel really lucky that he'll be moving with me. Our friendship is unusual, as we don't seem to have much in common - he's a star athlete and in great shape while I'm... not. I'm an English major and avid reader and he's... not. He's a Democrat, but much more conservative in a lot of ways than I am. I can never imagine Jason even entertaining the notion of an on-line diary, for example. But our 6-year friendship is stronger than it's ever been. In the past, a lot of our friendship seemed to be based in arguing about topics. But we've figured out ways to ignore the things that annoy us about the other person, and we don't really intentionally bring up the topics we argue about anymore (hunting, vegetarianism, baseball vs. football, country music, etc). We aren't avoiding anything. Rather, we've accepted each other. True acceptance, and even appreciation. I think that's cool. Jason is an all-around good guy - funny, honest, intelligent. Not that we aren't still competitive as hell with each other. I feel lucky to know him, and even a lot about him that I admire. Not that I'd ever admit that to him, though.
Anyhow, the trip was good. Exhausting, but good. North Carolina is no longer the to contender. Instead, Virginia has muscled its way into first place. But it's still anyone's game.