Seeing Southern

Three years ago, I tripped over an idea for a book. I was researching a travel article on distilleries in North Georgia, and who should I find, but the legend that my family had warned me about years earlier.

It only took one man, one wire, and one day in the summer of 1970 to make both the man and the place a legend. When Karl Wallenda constructed a wire across Tallulah Falls Gorge in Northeast Georgia, thousands came.

People are strange creatures, with all those peculiar attitudes, offbeat beliefs, bizarre actions, extraordinarily strange foundations. Funny thing, place all these creatures in one room, under one tent, and watch all them fade away.

Can you feel it? The coolness drifting through the air. Every now and then, the crisp breeze of fall breaks through the sizzle of summer, and it stops me in my tracks. Summer is winding down, and I get to slow down. Fall is on its way.

Before Roanoke, I had no clue as to the power of trains. In my mind, they were simply massive steel structures that shot off plumes of smoke (once up on a time), and today, simply an alternative to plane travel. Then, I met O. Winston Link.