Memphis

Woa, sorry (once again) for the delay between posts. We went to Tennessee last weekend - to Memphis for our best man's graduation from optometry school, and then on a little further east to visit my family for a few days. We were only in Memphis for a day, but it was an interesting day. If you've ever been to Memphis, you know what I mean. Apparently, we were lucky enough to be in town during "Memphis in May" which, from what I gathered, is a music festival that takes place downtown on Beale Street. Since we gathered at a restaurant on Beale after the graduation ceremonies, we got to witness a few interesting things. Some of these things might be commonplace to you, but for a small town girl like myself, they were a bit out of the norm.

1. I started the day by slamming my pinkie finger in the car door. Oddly, it hurts worse now than it did when it happened. You don't realize how much you use your pinkie until you injure it. This has nothing to do with Memphis or Beale Street - just another weird thing that happened to me that day.
2. A very polite and very skinny gentleman on a bike attempted to sing to us for tips while we hid from the rain under the awning as we were leaving the restaurant. Since he only sang two lines of the song (rather poorly, I might add) before he asked for a tip, we decided he didn't deserve one.
3. Beale Street was gated off, and we were carded as we entered. We were approached by several different religious groups passing out flyers and carrying signs. My favorites were "Ask me why you're going to hell" and another sign that had words randomly written all over it that said things like "Sinner", "Satan Lover", and "Fornicator". I wanted to point at that I'm married and fornicating isn't necessarily a sin for me, but I thought it best not to provoke a conversation. Not to say I don't agree with their message...just not their methods.
4. A little while later, it started to rain, and the religious demonstrators headed for cover. Most ran using their signs as make-shift umbrellas. One fellow in particular caught our eye - he was running up the street with a cross over his shoulder. We were all marveling at how fast he was going carrying a cross until someone noticed that this was no ordinary cross. This cross was outfitted with a wheel at the base to make it easier to drag around. I bet Jesus wishes he had one of those.
5. As we watched the procession of retreating demonstrators, sipping our adult beverages and being entertained as one can only be by watching people stranded in the rain, one of my friends called out, "Jesus would have stayed in the rain!" I don't think they heard him, but we thought it was funny.
6. Having done our part to stimulate the economy on Beale Street, we headed for the "Parking Can Be Fun" parking garage where we had entrusted our cars to the staff for a mere $5 each. On the way, we passed an ambulance and EMT's performing CPR on a girl right there on the sidewalk. Definitely a weird moment. I felt like we ought to be doing something to help, but we couldn't. And I don't think they wanted us watching, so we continued on our way.

Tennessee to be continued.