A special place

Since the weekend, I’ve been pretty vocal on Twitter about the flooding in Nashville.  I’m going to assume you’ve heard about it by now, although I talked to a friend just yesterday who hadn’t, so I know it’s possible.  For me, though, this hits close to home. Along with having friends in Nashville—friends who are safe, thankfully—I simply love that town.

Today I’ve reposted below a post from about a year ago when I was in Nashville to run the Country Music Marathon. I took a lot of photos that trip, and although the post is long, it conveys my genuine thrill and appreciation for the city.  A good part of the post focuses on my visit to the Grand Ole Opry, which looked like this when I was there:

And yesterday morning, looked like this:

It just makes my heart sink.

And yes, I know there are other things going on in the world, in our country. I know this.  And I know if any city can come together and recover, it’s Nashville.

In the coming days and weeks, there will be a lot of ways to help. I hope if you can help, you will.  It’s a special place, people.  And you can see a little of why I think so, below.

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Nashville: The other parts not about the running

Lest anyone believe that my trip to Tennessee was all about running and emotions and accomplishment, I’d like to point out that I came away with about 40 race day photos, and about 240 from the rest of the trip. Or there’s the fact that nearly two weeks later I’m still talking about food, like okra.  Man, okra is good stuff.

Anyway, I did some walking around Nashville, and some touristy stuff.  Oh, and let’s just face it, I love the touristy stuff.  My last trip to Nashville was all business (and by that I mean I immediately got high on sweet tea and didn’t take a lot of pictures) so it was nice to do some lookin’ this time around.

There was food, like the Pancake Pantry:

And mark my words right now, I think my grandmother’s twin was our waitress.  I don’t know where she came from, but she was the sweetest woman and I felt like maybe if I dripped something on my chin while eating she would have come over, spit on a napkin, and wiped my face for me.

Or maybe I just love her because she brought me sweet potato pancakes:

I restrained myself from eating all five the day before a marathon, but my lands, I could have.

We also drove the race course, as I mentioned in my race report, and my favorite thing about that had to have been how bright GREEN the entire city was. I was so happy to be in the midst of springtime at a moment when it was actually snowing here in the Rockies.

And then of course I had to hang out the car window and get all kinds of other photos, only some of which actually came out.

The day after the marathon was a bit of a different story.  I wanted to keep moving, but I was slow. Very, very slow.  While my friends went museum-ing, I did my own walking tour. Slowly.

But that’s probably also what allowed me to notice things I otherwise may not have noticed, like this:

I love Dolly. LOVE her.  As in I dressed as her for Halloween twice as a kid. There are three people on this Earth wherein my knees would go weak upon seeing, and she’s one of them.  She’s a genius, and hilarious.

And then of course I had to do some window shoppin’:

And some bar hoppin’:

And some star gazin’:

And some… okay, never mind, that’s getting old.

But I’m not gonna lie, I loved it.  I really do love country music. I love other music, too, of course but country music is good stuff. Let me know if you want to argue with me about that. Pack a lunch.

Maybe it’s just because I was moving so slowly, but there just seemed to be a little bit of charm around every corner.

And then we went to lunch.  At the Loveless Cafe. Can you say fried food?

Which is where the okra came in.  And the sweet tea.

…of which I had gallons.   Normally, I’d have limited myself a bit, but that’s the beauty of the day after a marathon: all the fried food you want. Sorry, that’s just how I see things.

Just a couple more stops.  Hold on, we can make it.  We can do it together! Someone sing Kum Ba Yah already.