August Break is Over

It's been a long month but a good one. August was bursting, ripe. We had a lovely vacation in Townsend, Tennessee with the family. We fished, swam and played in the river. We played loud, silly card games and ate well. We explored nature and the touristy side of things, Gatlinburg. I came home rested and content.

I've never been to Gatlinburg before and after an hour or so in the busy, mountain town, realized this name was prevalent.

They even had signs advertising an Ogle Dog, a famous foot long corn dog. Later on in the day, we stumbled upon an old school house in the Great Smoky Mountain National Park. Next to the school house, was a graveyard. I walked through, reading the tombstones and saw quite a few graves marked with the same name.

Martha Jane Huskey Ogle, and her family, were the first settlers in 1807 in what is now known as Gatlinburg. She moved her entire family there because it was her dying husband's last wish. He had traveled there and fell in love with the area, calling it the "land of paradise." Upon his return home to gather his family for the move, he grew very sick with malaria and died before he could return.

The story fascinated me. I have been thinking about Mary Ogle for a while now. Can you imagine how strong she must have been? What must it have been like to move an entire clan of family from Georgia to Tennessee in 1807? My family complained on a 12 hour car trip to Tennessee in air conditioned cars filled with things to do and snacks. I can't imagine moving that same family in covered wagons with all of our belongings to the remote mountains of Tennessee. I would love to have the chance to talk to Mary Ogle. I bet she has some incredible stories to tell. I wonder how she would feel about having a foot-long corn dog named after her family.

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And on another note, fall is in the air. It makes me want to climb into my bed and sleep. It's strange, when I was younger, I hated the summer and lived for fall and winter. Something has shifted. I feel as if I'm grieving the end of summer. I dread the coming months of cold and endless skies of gray.