you can’t go home again.
when I lived in Nashville, downtown was only a “destination” if you worked for the government, or in my case went to Hume-Fogg High. the Ryman was closed. no stadium. 2nd Ave 's attraction was a Sherwin Williams. the physically closest business to school was the shabbiest strip club of all time (I’m serious.) The Frist Center was still the post office. my school was falling apart, literally. Tootsies Orchid Lounge was there, but being a teen from Nashville in the late 80s, country music was in a huge nadir and teen poison. I couldn’t have gone anyway because underage. I see Tootsies on tv now and it looks clean. it looked the evil opposite of clean when I used to walk by.
Nashville was completely different last time I went 15 years ago. My friend who went to school with me goes regularly and describes it now as “a place for bachelorette parties. places have signs on the door ‘no bachelorette parties’ because there are so many.” Hume Fogg has been renovated.
it was a run-down dump full of nothing, but it was somehow welcoming once you got used to it. now it’s a shallow, glitzy could -be-anywhere.
Memphis seemed a lot the same back then when I visited. I’m glad I got to see Graceland when all his cars were still on premises and the guide was a local citizen.
I don’t think I’d care to go now that the guide is John Stamos on an ipad.
