American Mystery X: The Lost Colony, Roanoke, NC

The first and perhaps greatest mystery in American history is the fate of the lost Roanoke Colony. While our nation’s past is smattered with enough legends to fill a Nicholas Cage movie, the disappearance of an entire British colony ranks high.

The Lost Colony, as it is now colloquially called, was established on Roanoke Island in the Outer Banks of North Carolina. Colonists traveled from England in a series of three voyages beginning in 1585, overseen by Sir Walter Raleigh, who had been granted charter for the colony by Queen Elizabeth I. Voyages were led by artist John White, whose granddaughter Virginia Dare was the first English child born in North America.

In 1587, after failing to receive supplies from the motherland, White returned to England to request assistance from Sir Walter Raleigh, but the presence of the Spanish Armada caused the Queen to halt the sail of all ships for fear they would be overtaken by the enemy. Three years passed before White was able to sail back to America.

When White returned to Roanoke, he discovered that the settlers and their homes were completely gone - not burnt to the ground, not with arrows and tomahawks in the trees and rotting carcasses strewn about, but more as if the colony had never existed. All he found was the letters “CRO” carved into a tree and the word “Croatan” etched into a post. Unable to search deeper inland because the Queen apparently only allotted White to travel with the wimpiest crew of ocean-crossing explorers, he was unable to track down the missing colonists, who were never seen or heard from again.

Recreation of medieval-style fortress possibly used by Roanoke settlers.

One can’t blame people for getting antsy and a little anxious while waiting for help for three years. Today, people get cranky if they have to wait an extra three minutes for their latte, heaven forbid the milk steamer is working a little slow today and the line is extra long. Three years for the necessities while in the middle of the strange, tempestuous badlands that were 16th century America must have seemed like an eternity.

And while the feasibility of an alien abduction or cannibalism might be better suited for another Nicholas Cage movie (you’re welcome, Hollywood), the reality, according to most historians, is far more plausible.

The going got tough, and the tough got creative.

Historians believe the colonists, scared for their future and lacking in resources and supplies, joined a tribe of Native Americans, which seems to be a much more plausible theory among a group that considered siding with the Spanish rather than wait for help from the Brits. The colonists had a synergistic, collaborative relationship with the Native Americans, who showed them it was possible to survive off the land. Historians are now beginning to trace their trajectory, using British residents claiming to be relatives of those on the original journey to descendants of Native American tribes where people have been born blue-eyed and fair-skinned. As Jesse Pinkman would say, “Yeah, SCIENCE!”

Textbooks illustrated a much bloodier scenario, where the non-white, non-Christian “savages” tore through the colony, killing every single person they encountered and eliminating all evidence. Contrary to that gory theory, remains of disemboweled settlers (or any settlers at all) have never been discovered.

But why would a jingoistic take on history ever want students to think the earliest settlers got along with the Indians, let alone left to join them when things got rough? Unlike later settlers, these early pioneers were not looking for real estate. They were looking for riches. Therefore, the Indians did not pose a threat. It was no different than traveling to another country today. You like the people who live there and respect that this land is their land, not yours. Without the underlying sense of “olde tyme gentrification,” things will probably stay on the right side of harmony.

Looks friendly to us!

Manteo, the Native American Croatan chief who’s name was adopted for the town where The Lost Colony’s historic site now resides, allegedly assisted the colonists during their first winter and became a steadfast ally to the settlers. It is easy to see why they left their defunct colony to meld with a group of people who obviously had no problems navigating and surviving off of the land. However, that is too big a pill to swallow in a history class meant to instill some form of national pride - that settling on American soil was God’s will, that the Native Americans were little more than savage heathens, and that no English-speaking colony actually failed! (And how dare us to have suggested otherwise!)

In 1937, to commemorate the 350th anniversary of Virginia Dare’s birth, Paul Green’s production, The Lost Colony, debuted, depicting the settlers early days in America up until their mysterious disappearance. In 2012, the play celebrated its 75th season, ensuring the continuity of the story of the people of Roanoke and the civilization that vanished.

Not a bad spot for a play.

When we visited The Lost Colony, we met with Charles Massey, who oversees marketing efforts for the annual production. Massey supports the theory that the settlers ditched their colony to live with the natives because he possesses common sense. As a long-time North Carolinian, Massey understood why the harsh winters that plague the coast on an annual basis quickly became unlivable.

Part of John White’s job was to accurately measure and illustrate images of the landscape, despite having no experience as a cartographer or geographer. One of these maps, entitled La Virginea Pars and dated to 1586, was discovered in 2012 to be an exact match to an ariel photograph taken in modern times. Symbols on the map, studied by researchers at the First Colony Foundation, are believed to indicate that some colonists moved inland and possibly to Jamestown, as they were instructed to do if survival was threatened.

La Virginea Pars.

According to Massey, during the construction of a highway some time ago, workers uncovered remains believed to belong to members of the Lost Colony. This discovery, however, was quickly covered up. Massey also said that a newly discovered map, indicating exactly where they could have settled is now covered by a golf course. He could think of a few reasons why people would not be too keen on closing down a white man’s paradise to excavate bones.

After our meeting with Massey, we watched a film at the visitors’ center about the Lost Colony. To our dismay, the film depicted exactly what our middle school textbooks had - that the colonists were probably chased off and murdered by Indians. Deflated, especially after such an enlightening conversation with a man who was not a park ranger and is a lifelong devotee of the history of Roanoke, we heaved a collective sigh and went on our way.

And by that, of course, we mean we realized that the red-man was responsible for the failure of Roanoke, before going out and buying an SUV and playing a round of golf. Forget you read any suggestion otherwise about the fate of the Roanoke colony and rise for the flag salute!

The Aeroplane Flies High: Kitty Hawk, NC

Sign commemorating the Wright Brothers, with the hilltop monument in the background.

When I was little, somewhere between aspiring to become a Beatle, a lawyer, or a scientist, there was nothing I wanted more than to become an astronaut. I was entranced by the film about the Apollo 13 mission, despite its major plot point about the perils and enormous risks involved, like being stranded in outer space with a dwindling oxygen supply. Instead of focusing on the negative, I was captivated by the idea of weightlessness, of being able to break out of the boundaries of gravity, and seeing our great big planet outside of a spacecraft window, reduced to the size of a quarter off in the distance.

Right around that same time, perhaps to further spur my interest, my grandfather - Papa DiBlasi - gave me a book about the Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo space programs called All We Did Was Fly To The Moon. The book told the story from the perspectives of the astronauts, looking back. Some of them waxed poetic about their achievements, fully cognizant of their significance, while others spoke with a tone of wonder and awe, still baffled by their own accomplishments, even with the passing of time. My interest in the space program extended into an overall interest in flight and its history, from Otto Lilienthal’s early experiments with gliders to Chuck Yeager breaking the sound barrier in his Bell X-1.

Getting a drum kit for Christmas renewed my musical pursuits, but my fascination with flight has never gone away. (Except when I’m getting patted down at the airport by a surly rent-a-cop with an even bigger attitude problem than mine, but that’s something for another day.) It only made sense that I would someday travel out to where Orville and Wilbur Wright made aeronautical history in Kitty Hawk, North Carolina. The actual location of the Wright Brothers’ historic flight is now in what is called Kill Devil Hills, though in 1903 the area was part of Kitty Hawk, which adds to some confusion, especially with today's all-too-accurate GPS devices.

The Wright Brothers, who by today's standards of appearance would be more likely to be a priest (Wilbur) and the manager of a deli counter in Bensonhurst, Brooklyn (Orville).

Kitty Hawk is nestled in the Outer Banks of North Carolina, a series of narrow and unobstructed islands off the coast. Geographically, their almost anomalous location makes it prone to high winds. The high winds, coupled with the presence of sand allowing for a soft landing, made Kitty Hawk an ideal location for the Wright Brothers’ experiments with flight.

The visitor’s center on the premises doubles as a museum honoring both the Wright Brothers and other aviation pioneers, but the centerpiece is the main exhibition hall, where a functioning model of the Wright Brothers’ plane is on display. It was built by a devoted pilot-turned-historian who replicated every exact specification, from the spruce wood frame to the light cotton fabric that made up most of the plane’s body. The park ranger explained what made the Wright Brothers so noteworthy: their mastery of three-axis control.

Prior to Orville and Wilbur, early glider pilots and aviators only considered pitch (vertical motion) and yaw (horizontal motion) when designing and piloting their aircrafts. The third axis, roll (tilting motion, which combined both horizontal and vertical) was considered a grave danger, with a banking aircraft generally indicating an inevitable crash. Otto Lilienthal died in 1896 from similar circumstances, using not a series of rudders but rather the act of shifting his own weight in his glider to allow for rolling motion.

The hilltop monument (steep walk!) in Kill Devil Hills, overlooking the runway and visitors' center.

It was the Wright Brothers’ mastery of controlled roll that made powered flight a possibility. Learning this gave both of us a tangible sense of energy and excitement, knowing that where we were standing was where it all happened. Their achievements were so monumental that European journalists simply could not believe them. They were dismissed as bluffers, liars, and frauds, especially by the French. With Wilbur’s in-person demonstration at Le Mans in 1908, where he banked around the circular racetrack to a collectively jaw-dropped crowd for nearly two solid minutes, the much-deserved praise (along with retractions and apologies) came flowing in, and the Wright Brothers became globally famous.

We were also both blown away by thinking that the first flight was only 110 years ago. Although Wilbur died in 1912, Orville lived until 1948, witnessing the rapid growth and development of powered flight. He lived to see his invention, for which he and his brother had received no funding, grants, or aid, change the face of travel at both national and international levels. Orville witnessed the airplane become a fundamental component of combat during the Second World War, and he even lived long enough to witness Yeager’s historic flight in 1947.

From the marker stone on the flight path.

For those immortal 12 seconds Orville spent in the air during the first flight on December 17, 1903, his speed was just under 7 miles per hour. A mere forty-four years later, Chuck Yeager was able to travel faster than the speed of sound, peaking at 800 miles per hour. As fascinating as it is for us to look back, it must have been even more fascinating to bear witness to the rapid changes that took place.

120 feet in 12 seconds? That's enough to get through a single peanut.

Dining Review: Clyde Cooper's Barbecue (Raleigh, NC)

Uniquely Carolinian and remarkably tasty, Clyde Cooper’s is a barbecue joint unlike any other. In the heart of downtown Raleigh, Clyde Cooper’s has been a Carolina-style barbecue institution since 1938, and both it’s owners and long-time patrons have no problem letting you know they are the best in the business.

While barbecue has gained the reputation of being a largely Southern cuisine, there are four main regional styles of barbecue in the United States - Carolina, Kansas City, Texas, and Memphis. Carolina barbecue consists of pork which is dry rubbed with spices and smoked in a vinegar-based sauce. Kansas City barbecue is steeped in a thick, sweet sauce after it’s cooked. Texas barbecue is made with a tomato-based sauce and smoked over hickory wood to give it a distinct flavor. Memphis style is slow cooked over a pit and prepared either “wet” or “dry,” meaning with or without sauce.

Clyde Cooper’s is now owned by a husband and wife team, but the man responsible for its namesake ran the restaurant for more than 50 years. His delicious barbecue was not the only thing making Clyde Cooper a local hero. He was one of the first restaurant owners in the area to completely dismiss segregation, happily allowing patrons of any race to not only eat at his establishment, but to also sit wherever and with whomever they wanted. Talk about progressive dining!

The meat at Clyde Cooper’s comes either sliced, chopped, or coarse, which was pretty confusing for two people who have had about as little experience with barbecue as possible. That’s not to say it never enticed us, but growing up in the Midwest and Northeast, barbecue generally meant pulled pork bathed in store-bought sauce and served in a crock pot at family reunions. We both picked sliced barbecue sandwiches, topped with coleslaw and served with hot, fresh hush-puppies and pork rinds. The meat was so tender it nearly melted. The vinegar-based sauce was tangy, zesty, and spicy without being overpowering. Every table comes equipped with extra sauce for diners looking to drench their dish in even more spicy, vinegary goodness.

Clyde Cooper’s also offers barbecue chicken and baby back ribs along with classic sides like collard greens and steamed cabbage.

The establishment recently celebrated their 75th anniversary with a giant party and a fundraiser for the SPCA, which might seem a little ironic seeing as they are a predominantly meat-based restaurant. But hey, any friend to the animals is a friend of ours.

A meal for two cost less than $10, which was completely unfathomable coming from a place where the average cocktail costs the same amount. It seems as though the prices, much like the recipes, haven’t changed since the store first opened. If you’re in the Raleigh area, check out this fiery favorite and sample some incredible Carolina-style barbecue.

Clyde Cooper's Barbecue
109 East Davie Street, Raleigh, NC

919-832-7614

Gone With The Wind Exhibit, North Carolina Museum of History

One of the coolest things Raleigh, North Carolina offers is a free state history museum, which permanently houses an entire floor dedicated to the state's history as well as several rotating exhibitions. For the past fews months, and extended by popular demand, the museum has been home to an exhibit of memorabilia, costumes, and artifacts from the American classic Gone with the Wind. 

As a kid, I coveted a copy of the film my grandmother had taped off cable in 1987, intact with the archaic commercials and fuzzy sound. I didn’t care that it took six hours to watch an already lengthy movie. I swooned over the period costumes, the tangled romances, and the devastatingly handsome Clark Gable.

Alex's note: I grew up having only watched the movie once, in numerous segments, in my 7th grade English class. It wasn't until this January, after buying the movie on DVD for Alexa, that I had a chance to watch it all in one sitting. I found it to be much better than I had remembered. From a cinephile's point of view, it had some groundbreaking cinematography and set design. To use actual outdoor settings rather than studio lots or, even worse, indoor sets to mimic the outdoors, and to do this in full glorious Technicolor, was nothing less than impressive. And I won't lie, that Clark Gable is devastatingly handsome.

Original painted storyboard from the "Atlanta is burning" scene.

The exhibit was a behind the scenes look into a film I’ve loved since childhood. It included original storyboards, photographs, and notes from cast members. Hattie McDaniel, who played Mammy and subsequently became the first African-American to win an Academy Award for the role, sent thank-you notes to nearly every member of the production team, several of which appear in the exhibit. Because segregation was an ugly reality, even in Los Angeles in the late 1930s, McDaniel and the other African-American actors used separate dressing rooms and waited in separate areas between takes. It wasn’t until Clark Gable stepped in and demanded equal treatment for the black actors, threatening to walk off the set, that on-set segregation was done away with.

The film, even in its time, provoked mixed reactions for its portrayal of African-Americans. Butterfly McQueen, who was a dancer before starring as Prissy in Gone with the Wind, famously stated that she struggled with the role as it was difficult for her to play such an unintelligent character.

Alex's note: I've found a lot of the criticism for the film's portrayal of race to be overly PC. The fact is that there were domestics like Mammy and Prissy and they were slaves and they did speak in a certain vernacular. To dismiss historical accuracy as racism is misguided at best, but to make these claims without knowing the back-story of its actors demanding an integrated set is just foolish.

Other artifacts of note were original sheet music from the Gone with the Wind score, a copy of the novel owned by Butterfly McQueen, and the Oscar statue won by Vivien Leigh for Best Actress. Video footage of the 36 screen tests shot in the search for Scarlett O’Hara played on a screen, including one with Paulette Goddard who appeared in Modern Times and The Great Dictator with Charlie Chaplin.

Alex's note: As a Chaplin fan, I admire Paulette Goddard quite a lot. She is probably my favorite of Chaplin's leading ladies in his feature films, but her personality and affect would have made her a terrible choice for Miss Scarlett. If there had been a scene where we met Scarlett's street-wise cousin from the North, then Goddard would have been a shoe-in!

Butterfly McQueen's copy of the novel.

Sheet music to the original score.

Vivien Leigh's Oscar for Best Actress.

The costume section included the outfit worn by Bonnie Blue Butler in the fateful horse riding scene and the straw hat Scarlett wore to the barbecue at Twelve Oaks.

Bonnie's equestrian outfit.

Scarlett's "Shantytown" dress.

Scarlett's hat for the Twelve Oaks barbecue.

Dining Review: 6 Crabs (Williamsburg, VA)

Whether you hate golf or think spas are overly decadent, in a destination town like Williamsburg, one thing everyone can agree on is going out to eat. As a town so reliant on visitors, having unique and delicious restaurants is a necessity, especially when surrounded by the bevy of standard chain restaurants like a gantry of British soldiers.

Our motel offered suggestions and deals for over thirty local haunts, which we found not only overwhelming but off-putting. (Sorry, but offering $15 off the cost of a meal doesn’t sound like a bargain - it tells us that you’re gouging the tourists!) Local flavor should be able to be summed up in a handful of restaurants, not enough to overflow the food court at the Mall of America.

6 Crabs stands out because it is not a fancy place. It is a humble and modest family-run restaurant, so nondescript that if you blink, you might miss it. There’s no neon sign out on Interstate 64 for it, flashing and screaming “FOOD. FIVE MILES.” It is a brick square on a quiet road, and it just happens to serve some incredible food.

It does not need elegance, pomp, or marketing tactics to get you in the door. It oozes charm at first sight, with its wood-paneled dining room boasting only four tiny cafe-style tables. Yet it remains one the the simplest, most authentic seafood experiences we have ever had.

This should be written into the Virginia Declaration of Rights.

 The pitfall of many seafood joints is they take the food too seriously. Seafood, provided that it is fresh, needs only a little lemon, maybe a touch of salt and pepper. That’s all it needs, in the same way a good steak is complimented by just a dash of pepper. Any more is just ridiculous and, frankly, it lets us know that your mahi-mahi has been sitting in the fridge for a few too many days.

6 Crabs is simple and unrefined, but that is because it knows that it sells great, fresh seafood and doesn’t need to compete with high-end seafood restaurants that boast they serve pan-seared salmon accompanied by pickled radishes, yellow teardrop tomatoes, and a yuca puree in a pinot noir reduction. If the title of the dish is longer than four words, they’re doing it wrong.

We picked the crab cake dinner and a combination platter that included oysters, scallops, flounder, and shrimp. Each dish was served with hush puppies, a Southern staple of fried corn meal nuggets. In our time reviewing restaurants, not to mention our lives as seafood lovers, we have both sampled our share of crab cakes. While our past experiences included everything from over-fried patties with too much breading to over-the-top concoctions where the crab disappeared under a zillion spices and they probably could have been serving you chicken, 6 Crabs’ version of this classic dish was outstanding!

They were perfectly seasoned, with the right amount of kick and filled with fresh crab meat. The combination platter, a simple meeting of seafood and golden batter, was scrumptious. The light, crispy crust accentuated the flavor of each different item. As people who rarely eat anything fried, this was a complete departure for us. We ate every single bite.

The beauty is that their dishes don’t need any extra condiments. Maybe a dash of ketchup for the fries, maybe cocktail sauce or Sriracha if you’re feeling spicy, but the fish-meat itself was perfect. Aside from insanely good grub, which you can take to go if you’re the kind of diner who likes to stretch out with his or her food, 6 Crabs offers the option to purchase raw seafood and take it home to cook as you like, including croaker, a delicious, mild-tasting fish that is common to the region. And, in line with the namesake, 6 Crabs offers a variety of crabs, including soft-shell and snow, for patrons to steam at home.

6 Crabs
118 Second Street, Williamsburg, VA

757-258-7757

Journey Through The Past: Colonial Williamsburg, VA

Friendly locals.

America’s relatively young age, especially in comparison to nearly the entire rest of the world, affords people the ability to visit the intact remnants of one of its first commercial and cultural capitals. Unlike the historic sites of other countries, Colonial Williamsburg is still essentially a livable, functioning town, provided you’re cool to give up the comfy stuff like internet and toilets. 

We are both huge fans of most forms of entertainment dealing with time travel, and visiting the dirt roads of Colonial Williamsburg is probably the closest we will get until the flux capacitor becomes available on the retail market. While laden with history lessons and authenticity, Williamsburg retains its charm amidst its pristine appearance (we were sure there’d be more horse poop on the streets) and talented period actors. They all spoke like they were witnessing the birth of a nation. It is their version of Groundhog Day, proclaiming to every tourist that TODAY is the day the Virginia Declaration of Rights is being debated at the Capitol Building, every single day. 

One tavern proprietor on Duke of Gloucester Street tried to entice us to visit her establishment pub for the town’s best “wild game pye.” When Alex mentioned the guard at the Governor’s Mansion recommended it, the restauranteur told us in a slightly hushed aside that the pye’s meat is the most tender in town because she gets her supply from the native Cherokees, who sneak up on their prey, which keeps them from tensing up. When she heard Alex’s hoarse voice and deep cough from a week-long sinus infection, she demanded we instead go to the apothecary for horehound drops. He responded with a quip that he hoped he would be bled with leeches as treatment. She gave a hearty laugh and wished us both a good day and for better health soon.

Everyone in modern garb looks like a tourist here, but that is not a bad thing. However, everyone’s a tourist in a place no one lives, against what the friendly tavern keeper and other honest Colonial folk want you to believe. Neither of us have any shame in saying that we looked and acted like tourists the whole day, snapping photos at every turn, including the obligatory photo in the pillories for counts of buggery and making winds on the Sabbath.

Arrested, tried, and convicted for breaking ye olde wyndes on ye Lord's day.

Clearly, arrested, tried, and convicted (within 20 minutes!) for buggery. 

Some people are Disney obsessives, and they go to one of the parks every single year. For others, a pilgrimage to Graceland is necessary while passing through Memphis. For two history geeks like us, it’s a place like Colonial Williamsburg that does it for us. We kept cracking each other up by prefacing every possible noun with “ye olde.” Ye olde cheese shop. Ye olde iPhone. Ye olde hydroelectric power generator.

As a country obsessed with progress and modernity, it is astounding to visit a place in America so diligently preserved for the sake of its history, a subtle and often unseen wink to the radicals who made it possible for a government such as ours to exist. While visiting the Capitol Building, our lively guide kept referring to the brewing conflict between the colonies and the Crown as one that could either be a massive victory for personal freedom, or an embarrassing defeat. The austere pages of a history book tell a rather flat story, but hearing a description of the American Revolution from a person playing a character from that period, reminded us that these familiar faces from marble sculptures, coins, and dollar bills were far more than just recognizable oil paintings. Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Paine, and George Washington were all regarded as local noblemen, holders of property (a true symbol of status), owners of slaves (an even bigger symbol of status), and friends of the loyalist colonial governor until the time of the conflict.

The Capitol Building 

With that perspective in mind, it was slightly unsettling to think that our founding fathers, had they lost the conflict they had waged, would have been executed for treason, never mind that we would be driving on the left side of the road, eating boiled beef for Sunday joints, and calling cookies “biscuits.” What codswallop! 

We truly have come a long way from being a population with essentially no rights. While there is still work to be done - women’s rights, gay rights, religious tolerance, to name a few - it is easy to forget where we have come from. At the end of the Capitol tour, we felt something we had both been without for years: national pride. The tour guide looked towards the future of what would become democracy and referred to it as “the great experiment, one that could change the face of the entire world.” 

Our guide speaking in the very courtroom where we were tried for our respective crimes.

His profound optimism, though delivered in character, struck both of us and we couldn’t help but smile. Walking back to our motel from the grounds of Colonial Williamsburg, we talked the whole time about how inspired we were. Perhaps if people today considered themselves subjects within this “great experiment,” we could fill the gaps that divide us as a nation on both cultural and political fronts.

Alexa's Prologue

I always knew my roots would never grow deep in New York. It was like a boyfriend you dated for one swift summer, always aware that it wouldn’t be permanent because it was too dangerous and had no intentions of treating you the way you deserved to be treated. I liked the way people’s eyes burst when I said the words “New York.” It was the thing to do in your early 20s, the big, bad city. Everything up until my first day there told me so, and they never gave any bad advice on Sex and the City, right?

Like so many other fevered, underdeveloped dreams-turned-realities of life in New York City, mine began with a waitressing stint and a full-time internship. The internship, at a weekly newspaper in Queens, eventually transformed into a reporting job, devolving quickly into the polar plunge that was my welcome into the working world. Every task went unthanked, and nights and weekends were abandoned to attend an advertiser’s event at the sacrifice of true journalism. Stories that had the potential to bother an advertiser (i.e. anything revealing the seedy underbelly of major redevelopment projects, including those forcing businesses and long-term residents to relocate). Under the thumb of a ruthless mother and son publishing team, the tenured Editor-in-Chief bowed to their every whim. The phrase “what can I do?” will probably be engraved on this woman’s tombstone.

A string of bad luck throughout my formative years taught me to believe one, everlasting truth -- everything, even the worst experience/job/relationship imaginable, is worth it if you make it through having learned something. It means it wasn’t a waste.

While I survived with a newly formed sense of professional reality, I resigned in a mild-worded email. That doesn’t mean I didn’t hallucinate about the ultimate resignation letter.

“Dear Mrs. and Junior Employer,

I thank you greatly for the opportunity to work here over the past year and some odd months. It truly has been a lesson in humility, degradation and above all else, a blaring introduction into the professional world. Without your mistreatment, I truly wouldn’t know what it is to be an adult in 21st century America, and for that, I am forever indebted.

As a bright-eyed, albeit naive, 22-year-old, I didn’t know that the vast majority of those in power achieved their status because of greed. You didn’t battle your way to the top in a string of morally sound ventures. You crushed every tiny soul under your bloated vision of wealth and glory.

To quote a former co-worker who shall remain anonymous at the behest of retaining his position, “If you showed your employees a tenth of an iota of an ounce of the compassion you think you do, then you might have a chance at being the great humanitarian you think you are.” While many of your employees struggled to pay hospital bills, student loans and college tuitions, you dressed your infant son in a fur-lined sweater and purchased a million dollar penthouse overlooking the Manhattan skyline. You took advantage of people’s desperate situations during a desperate time. A French monarch did the same thing in the 18th century, and it didn’t turn out so well.

It doesn’t matter how many galas you throw, dressed in multicolored fur like the Cruella de Vil that you are, or how many times you use the word “fabulous” to describe everything from the underpaid staff who organize your events to the luxury automobile(s) you so generously slip under company expenses. You once “accidentally” referred to readers as “customers,” adjusting your mistake only after it had been pointed out to you. You would rather sell people the stories you and your advertisers want them to read than give people the real news. If a meaningful story makes its way past four layers of scrutiny, only then is it shoved to the back of the book. Poor people and minorities can’t pay for prime space, I guess.

Remember when you made the editor change the cover because there was someone of an ethnic minority on it?

Remember when you sent me to an event that wasn’t even happening, twice in one week?

I’d insert the Youtube link for Fleetwood Mac’s “Go Your Own Way,” but figured it wasn’t worth inconveniencing one of your five assistants to help you open it. Basically, loving you is definitely not the right thing to do.

Hugs and Kisses,
Alexa

P.S. I know exactly how long it takes the art department to airbrush your neck.

I became a writer because I wanted to tell people’s untold stories, those of people who otherwise might not have a voice. Instead, my passion was tooled to help the wealthy become even wealthier.

So I left, choosing to preserve my principals over my paycheck. I owed the world more than well-written advertisements for expensive Catholic schools and home furnishings. Thankfully, with Alex expressing similar disinterest towards continuing a life in New York, the idea for the American Weirdness project came together seamlessly. We packed our earthly goods, said goodbye to some of the greatest co-workers/friends we had ever met and let our wanderlust take hold. We were born to run.

This post, and subsequently most of this blog, is dedicated to anyone who refuses to settle and anyone who grants themselves the experience of discovery.

Alex's Prologue

“We’ve got to get out while we’re young,

Because tramps like us, baby, we were born to run…”

-         Bruce Springsteen, “Born To Run”

In the past 26 years, my life so far has been a series of unexpected turns, chance encounters, and more than a few surprising detours. A stroke of good luck here, a minor decision having major consequences there, all of them brought me to where I am today. I also know I can say right now, without fear of contradiction, that Alexa’s life has followed a similarly varied path. Our idea of ditching our lives in New York City for a cross-country roadtrip should not be such a surprise for either of us.

It certainly didn’t faze our parents, who were all surprisingly enthusiastic and supportive, offering only the most practical of concerns and questions. Our closest friends, though they were saddened to hear that we were leaving, gave us nothing but encouragement, well-wishes, and even a few ideas. Our nearest and dearest mentors all said the same thing:

“This is the perfect time for you two to do this!”

From the moment Alexa and I started talking about our future as heads of a family unit, we happily agreed that we did not want to raise children in New York City. Neither of us wanted to be that poor sap, desperately attempting to calm our screaming toddler on the train, mouthing “sorry” to all the nearby straphangers shooting a collective death stare. We agreed we would be ready to relocate elsewhere, wherever that may be, within “three to five years.” Seemed like a fair estimate. After all, we both had steady full-time jobs and were getting established in our respective fields.

As soon as we thought we knew what our long-term plans would be, the proverbial shit hit the proverbial fan. “Three to five years” rapidly evaporated into “when our lease is up next August” after several misadventures, including Alexa suffering an attempted carjacking in front of our own building in Long Island City. A mere two months later, right around the corner from our place, someone broke into our car, leaving behind our copies of Marquee Moon by Television and Frank Ocean’s Channel Orange but swiping my DVD  of Charlie Chaplin’s The Great Dictator and a laptop charger. Whoever the thief was, the shithead at least had good taste in movies. (And I certainly hope they have been able to keep their laptop charged!)

Maybe it's also worth mentioning that in both instances, the authorities offered no help. Because - for some reason - Alexa didn't stick around long enough after her would-be assailant made a grab for her door handle, thus not seeing a weapon or hearing the man issue a verbal threat, the cops said the best they could do was record an incident of "attempted harassment." Not "attempted assault," not "attempted vehicular theft," not "scaring the shit out of a 23-year-old whose previous news beat included covering violent crimes." Attempted harassment. In the case of the theft, the cops didn't even show up in response to our call. While it can't be proven directly, we both suspected these half-assed responses were part of an initiative to keep crime stats in an "up and coming neighborhood" down. (We pay taxes for this?)

We cut our timetable even shorter when we both hit critical mass at our jobs. For me, it was a shortage of teaching opportunities for both paid and volunteer gigs, coupled with the soul-crushing drudgery of being chained to a cubicle from 9 to 5, answering the same stupid questions from the same stupid people through increasingly clenched teeth, and hoping no one decided to give me a shove on a cramped subway platform either to or from the office because I had made the mistake of being in their way.

For Alexa, it was even worse, with her job at a weekly publication in Queens wearing her down mentally, emotionally, and physically. Her situation at the paper in question could serve as the impetus for either a droll observational sitcom or a work of sheer terror, and one that I think may best be saved for her own words, of which she has many. (I’m serious – buy her a Jameson and ginger ale and just sit back!)

In short, we had both come out to New York City to pursue THE DREAM, because we had grown up thinking it was the only place to go if we wanted to make it big, like many people our age. In our short time in the professional world, we both received a good deal of maltreatment and abuse within it. For us, THE DREAM morphed, to crib from Wilfred Owen, into THE GREAT LIE, a world where our superiors regarded us as replaceable ants who should be grateful for the opportunity to even have a job, what with the economy being what it is, quit our bitching, keep our heads down, and hope we weren’t arbitrarily laid off. We concluded that in the universe where our corporate “greed is good” overlords were in charge, in order to get ahead, to get recognition, or simply to get that big break, one merely needed to abandon their principles.

Of course, we were having none of that. 

Us and our silly principles.

Though our experiences were different, we both ultimately shared the same grievance. At best, all we were doing was earning more money for our already wealthy bosses, without either of us ever seeing an extra penny in our paychecks. At worst, everything we did in the course of a week did nothing to better the lives of people in need. Witnessing people who have been dealt a shitty hand in life from the start, from my time working for the city’s 311 hotline to Alexa’s work at the newspaper, seeing the dramatic disparity in the quality of life where we lived brought out a strong urge in both of us to do something meaningful, something profound.

But what?

After considering several options, including trips to other parts of the world, we decided that we would go everywhere (yes, even Alaska), see as much of this country as we can, and then write about our experiences. Every part of the United States has its own unique history, cuisine, and culture. Each town, which from the outset is just part of a massive constellation of dots on a map, has its own story to tell. We want to document and share those stories with our readers. 

At the present time, our nation has become increasingly divided. Forgive my soap-boxing, but the "us vs. them" mentality that dominates our culture has become more destructive, sowing seeds of hatred rather than simply agreeing to differ on one's political viewpoints. One of my dearest coworkers at my boring office job was a hard-nosed Republican, and while we disagreed on a lot of policy issues, we could still ultimately agree that GoodFellas is one of the best movies ever made, and most importantly, he was a terrific friend. (We also shared a common disdain for Michael Bloomberg, and neither of us voted for Obama - Alexa and I both voted for Green Party candidate Jill Stein.)

As cheesy as it may sound, hopefully with our trip we can learn more about one another, recognizing our similarities while at the same time celebrating our differences.

Next stop: Colonial Williamsburg, Virginia!

Our Blogspot page will feature unedited content, more pictures, and extra entries. Additionally, I will be posting weekly updates on Woman Around Town, an entertainment website based out of NYC and DC, run by author Charlene Giannetti and publisher Debra Toppeta, that I have written for since 2010. My working title for the weekly column on WAT is The Scenic Route, with Alex & Alexa. A slightly different version of the above entry will be available soon on the site.