On the Evening of Battle
The battle started 150 years ago, tomorrow morning. Chancellorsville. The Crossroads of Fire. It would become Lee’s greatest victory of the Civil War. The High Water Mark of the Confederacy-at least as I have come to know it.
I’m back at Fredericksburg & Spotsylvania National Military Park for another summer, helping out because of staff cuts that have resulted from the government sequester. I’ll work 3-4 days a week and commute home so I can be with Jackson the other days of the week. It should let me spend some good time on the battlefields and some good time with my boy. Things kick off with the Chancellorsville Sesquicentennial, beginning tomorrow.
I’m housed again in the maid’s quarters above the kitchen in Q2. I chose this room because it’s self-contained, with its own bathroom and easy access to the back door, so I can slip in and out and avoid the general goings-on of the house this summer if I so choose. Likewise, when Jackson or Steph are here, we’ll be able to pretty much keep to ourselves.
I chose this room, too, because this is where Caity lived during the year of our long-distance relationship. This is where we’d set up house when I’d come down on the weekends or over breaks. We lived like a couple sharing a small efficiency apartment, and it was nice to be in such close quarters, sharing space so intimately.
It’s a room full of ghosts, then, but I chose to be housed here-specifically requested this room-in almost obstinent defiance of that ghost. I will force myself upon that ghost and share space out of spite. It is a grudge match.
I have brought a candle with me, which I’ve plugged in and turned on and set in the window. Even here, I believe in hope. Maybe it’s even that hope for Caity, but certainly it’s a larger hope for good things ahead, for love, for life. There’s hope for me.
I’m back at Fredericksburg & Spotsylvania National Military Park for another summer, helping out because of staff cuts that have resulted from the government sequester. I’ll work 3-4 days a week and commute home so I can be with Jackson the other days of the week. It should let me spend some good time on the battlefields and some good time with my boy. Things kick off with the Chancellorsville Sesquicentennial, beginning tomorrow.
I’m housed again in the maid’s quarters above the kitchen in Q2. I chose this room because it’s self-contained, with its own bathroom and easy access to the back door, so I can slip in and out and avoid the general goings-on of the house this summer if I so choose. Likewise, when Jackson or Steph are here, we’ll be able to pretty much keep to ourselves.
I chose this room, too, because this is where Caity lived during the year of our long-distance relationship. This is where we’d set up house when I’d come down on the weekends or over breaks. We lived like a couple sharing a small efficiency apartment, and it was nice to be in such close quarters, sharing space so intimately.
It’s a room full of ghosts, then, but I chose to be housed here-specifically requested this room-in almost obstinent defiance of that ghost. I will force myself upon that ghost and share space out of spite. It is a grudge match.
I have brought a candle with me, which I’ve plugged in and turned on and set in the window. Even here, I believe in hope. Maybe it’s even that hope for Caity, but certainly it’s a larger hope for good things ahead, for love, for life. There’s hope for me.