Memories Run Deep

Fall is a bittersweet time, a sentiment my soul has always recognized on some level buried deep. My birthday is in September and even as a child amongst all the celebration of another year older, I can remember a tiny smidge of grief at the previous age laid to rest. Being from Georgia, my autumn memories are dusty hot alongside coolly fragrant with crispy leaves and burn piles in the neighborhood, often all on the same day (a fond smile here for the mercurial weather in the south). One thing that never failed to delight me was the anticipation of a "fall mountain trip" with my father. Now, if you've had the great good fortune to be in north Georgia at any time of the year, you'll appreciate what an old and mysterious place the foothills of the Appalachian mountains can be, but never more than in those months that mark the end of another year. I'll try to leave off the geology lesson (the Appalachians are among the oldest existing mountain ranges on Earth) as well as the history tutorial (archaeological evidence suggests the ancestors of the Cherokee Nation were settled in north Georgia long before 1000 BCE), but I will tell you that this part of the world holds a certain magic, at least to one little suburban Atlanta girl growing up in the 1980s. And going to such a place with this man I idolized and would follow anywhere? That was a treat and a treasure not to be missed.

Our adventure would start early in the morning with breakfast at the Rexall Grill before we headed off up the road. I could map it out for you...Dahlonega, Cleveland, and maybe a stop to Anna Ruby, the waterfalls that are Amicalola​ Falls' lesser-known little sister. Every roadside antique shop was an opportunity to mine for treasure and when we got hungry, we stopped for German food in Helen (an eccentric little town done entirely in a 1970s Bavarian theme, that, in the aforementioned ‘80s, included community trash cans painted with dirdls and lederhosen, and carved Alpine trolls on street corners). No mountain trip day was complete without a short detour to see the Ettowah Indian Mounds and visit the Old Sautee Store, which featured an automatonic cat that would pop up without warning from an old peanut barrel. No matter what winding road we ended up on, my dad always knew exactly where he was, and I usually fell asleep on the way home with a "souvenir" of the day in my hand, feeling safe, secure, and full of all the mystery and magic that those old mountains so willingly bestowed.

Dillard, Georgia