April 18, 2007 – I hope Neil Young will remember. Southern man doesn't need him around anyhow.

So, tonight I am sitting in my tent in what has to be one of the most beautiful places in the world. FDR knew it when he chose this place to die.

These are both views from my campsite. Envy me again.

When a tree falls in the forest, does FDR hear it?

Up your treehole!

A little creek I hiked around.

I didn’t go up here because the hike was about three miles. Too much, too late.

Hellboy and the Honky Chateau from across Lake Delano.

Warm Springs (which I am only a few miles from) was Roosevelt’s hideaway from the rest of the world. And when a man that powerful needs to hide away, he needs an amazing place. I’m not talking about no Crawford, Fucking Texas. Warm Springs and Pine Mountain, Georgia are amazing.

Tomorrow I plan on going into Warm Springs and checking out the Little White House where Roosevelt died, but tonight I’m just enjoying the beauty that is Lake Delanor in FDR State Park.

But earlier today wasn’t so pretty. I learned some things about the Civil Rights Movement in America and then, right here on the lake, witnessed a rape.

Maybe I should start with that one so people are totally freaked out.

I was sitting here at the park bench by my campsite (which, once again, is right on the lake…I keep lucking into the sweet spots of campgrounds) quietly reading my book, minding my own business when a big white duck started making all kinds of racket. She (I’m guessing it was a she…hopefully) was swimming pretty close to me. Then a mallard whooshed up to her and just mounted her right there! No questions asked! I had always heard that ducks were the only animals besides humans that practiced rape, but I never thought that I would actually witness it! He was on top of her and kept biting her neck and dunking her head under water. It was actually pretty brutal. You think the donkey punch is bad. Try getting dunked six or seven times before the orgasm.

Eventually, he finished, dismounted and both parties cleaned themselves up. No snuggling. No pillow talk. Not even a ‘Meh. Peace out.’

Fuck ducks. They’re crazy.

So, now let’s back up.

I woke up this morning in my semi-comfy bed at the semi-clean Birmingham Motel 6 and got ready to go take in the Civil Rights Institute. Party!

I was going to go to the nearby Waffle House for breakfast, but I passed by the Culinard Bakery…that’s a bakery for the local culinary school. Gotta check it out, right?

Not bad at all, by the way. Probably better than anything I would have gotten at the Waffle House.

I made it to the Institute with no problem and parked in what used to be (and kind of still is) the black business center of town. I would learn more about that later.

I had to check my backpack and I could only hope that they security lady didn’t hear my laptop motor whirring and think it was a bomb. That thought occurred to me when I found out that Birmingham used to be called ‘Bombingham.’

I guess when I kept hearing of the city Birmingham, I never thought to put all of the times I heard it together to create the town that actually IS Birmingham. It is the birth place of the American Civil Rights Movement. It’s where just about everything went down. The sit-ins at Woolworth’s? Birmingham. The four little girls killed in a church bombing? Birmingham. A lot of Dr. Martin Luther King’s big moments? Birmingham. Brown vs. The Board of Education? Birmingham. Rosa Parks? Ok, that was Memphis, but Birmingham is like the nexus of the entire movement.

The Institute is pretty amazing. You would think that it would just be a bunch of papers and pictures and things. And, yeah, for the most part it is. But those pictures tell one of the worst stories in American history. They tell how one group of people kept another group of people down just because they look a little different. When I was reading about Bloody Sunday (the day a bunch of black people were killed because they wanted to vote), and ‘Give Peace A Chance’ started playing at another display nearby, I have to admit that I almost lost it a little bit.

Jacub, the guy I was staying with in New Orleans, said that an American going to visit there is like him (a Czech) going to a Holocaust museum. Yeah, I wasn’t there and neither was anyone in my family, but it still affects me in ways that it wouldn’t someone from another country. America’s treatment of black people throughout our history is basically our Holocaust. They weren’t nearly wiped out, but they damn sure were tortured until they wished that they were.

It was an amazing journey and it made me even more disappointed in America than I already was. I love the ideas behind the country so much, but when you see an entire group of people shut out of that idea by a bunch of ignorant assholes, it hurts.

When I left the Institute, I went across the street to Kelly Ingram Park. It has a lot of statues and artwork depicting different moments in the Movement. I was approached by an old black man who asked if I had a camera. I said I did and he said, ‘Good, you gonna need it.’ He then went on to tell me how he was there for the bombing of the church right across the street back in 1963. He saw the little girls laid out on the steps. He was thrown in jail six times. And he told me that the guys who are taking people on tours of Ingram Park (it’s a really small park, no tour necessary, I didn’t think) are spewing bullshit just to get money for crack.

(This is the oldest church in Birmingham. It was the bottom right window that was blown out in the bomb. And it was at the foot of these steps that the four little girls were laid out. One had no arms. Another had no head. Spike Lee absolutely has something to be pissed about.)

He did ask for money because he’s homeless and smelled of alcohol, but I only had a 20. As much as I wanted to give him something, I didn’t want to give him that much. He said not to worry about it, shook my hand and walked over to his friend. I think he was just glad to tell someone his story.

So I left Birmingham with a slightly different outlook. I’m still kind of working on what that outlook is, but I know it’s changed. There’s a lot of reparation to do in this country and, honestly, it needs to come from both sides. The Civil Rights Movement isn’t over yet. We’ve replaced one set of stereotypes with another. And until we can get kids now to stop living those stereotypes, it’s going to be hard to repair what has been done in the past.

I do have one question, though: why is it that Alabama was the last fucking state in the Union to hear of the enlightenment? I just don’t understand. It made me want to get the fuck out as soon as possible.

(The lighter side of Birmingham…the Carver Theatre was a black theatre back in the day. Lots of happy times there. Still some happy times with Menopause: The Musical!)

So, now I sit in my tent, typing this and hearing the sweet strains of duck rape and a nearby RV’s tv. I am the only tent in the entire campground. There are a LOT of RVs. It’s crazy. One looks like a giant city bus.

But I have the bathroom all to myself.