Lest you think last week was all about Graceland, let me also emphasize that I visited gardens in both Phoenix and Memphis.
One of the gardens I visited was the Memphis Botanical Garden. I have posted new photos in the gallery, so take a look when you get the chance.
The Memphis Botanical Garden is a sprawling piece of property with good bones and a nice infrastructure–lovely water features, wide paths and beautiful old trees to provide much-needed shade in the Memphis heat. It is a popular venue for concerts, fairs and such. I would imagine that the locals also make good use of the paths for their walking exercise.
But, sadly, the place doesn’t really excel at the whole garden concept. The designers suffer from myopia and a distinct lack of imagination. The result is that they devote inordinate swaths of space to single plant types. There’s a rose garden. A hosta garden. A lily garden. A daylily garden. You get the picture.
Because there is such a single focus here, single focus there, the garden suffers from ugly patches of plants not at their glory. One of the big reasons that you mix plants in borders and such is to have constant interest–so everything doesn’t just up and die at once, leaving you with a dead looking garden.
The place that the Memphis Botanical Garden really shines, however, is in its Japanese Garden. There is a lovely half-moon bridge and a nice use of bamboo, sedges and other plants native to the region.
Nevertheless, it’s worth a visit and a stroll, particularly if you’re going to visit the Dixon Gallery and Gardens, which is located right across the road. (More on that next.)
By the way, if I play my cards right, I may also be visiting the Chicago Botanical Garden next week. I’m keeping my fingers crossed that I”ll have time.
Robin
I have posted a number of new photos of my recent visit to Graceland in my photo album. But I want to offer a few observations to go along with the obvious voyeurism of these pix.
To this day, Lisa Marie still own Graceland. She long ago sold off everything else from her father’s estate to support the lifestyle to which she has become accustomed. But she has held on to Graceland. I presume that it serves three functions: 1) As a source of continuing income to support the aforementioned lifestyle and 2) to honor her dear old pops and 3) to fend off public criticism for selling off Graceland.
If I were Lisa Marie (which I clearly am not) I would do several things regarding Graceland and the memory of my dear, departed father.
1) If I were Lisa Marie, I would raise the overall level of the current Graceland tour from a National Enquirer-like spectacle of a dead, drug-obsessed superstar to the level of a National Historic Monument to a legend.
We might forgive Lisa Marie (just a little bit) for her inability to see the fine distinction between these two. After all, she grew up as a girl and lived her adult life as a subject of the National Enquirer. She had a birthday party with her little girl friends on an AIRPLANE named after her during a time when NO ONE but the elite flew anywhere. Her daddy flew her to Colorado to play in the snow FOR A FEW MINUTES when he realized that she had never seen the stuff. She has been married to some exceedingly questionable characters.
Given this type of history, she might not understand that there is a better, more refined way of doing things.
For example, she could re-orient the whole tour from a voyeuristic glimpse into Elvis’s private life into the story of his contribution to rock and roll. Oh, I understand that she needs to make a buck to pay for her own extravagant lifestyle and that the voyeuristic tour SELLS. But I think there is a continuum and she has slid so far to the end that she could afford to slip back a bit toward the middle.
She could actually PLAY SOME OF HIS MUSIC throughout the tour. Aha! What a concept!!!!
She could talk about some of the major MUSICAL events that occurred while he was living at Graceland. Or the host of MUSICAL SUPERSTARS who joined him in the various and sundry rooms in his home. She could overall put his life into context of his contribution to music. Not just tell the story of a man who lived in a house.
2) Along the same vein, she could spruce the place up a bit. If I were Lisa Marie, the first thing I would do would be to hire a proper lawn service. The grass looks unkempt and the poor excuses for flowers in the beds look like something even the local high school key club would not claim credit for. Even if Elvis didn’t splurge on the flora during his lifetime, Lisa Marie could at least do that now in his memory.
I would also upgrade the signs. The local 7-11 has better quality signs than Graceland. The ones they have are digitally produced on foamcore. It reeks of cheap, cheap, cheap. It’s like she went to the Wal-Mart Sign Shoppe.
3) If I were Lisa Marie, I would not ignore or disregard the hard lessons of my father’s death. I would acknowledge that he was sensitive, troubled and needed help he did not get. I would implore the Graceland visitors to not let the drug problems and mental deterioration that happened to my dear old dad happen to the people they love. I believe this can be done in an exceedingly sensitive manner.
At the end of the tour I would have people donate to an Elvis Presley Musician’s Drug Rehab/Rescue program. (We need a catchy name.)
4) Finally, if I were Lisa Marie, I would stop dating, and especially marrying, creeps and losers. I mean, really. Who marries both Michael Jackson AND Nicholas Cage? Lisa Marie needs her own personal intervention program.
For what it’s worth. That’s what I would do if I were Lisa Marie.
The End.
Robin
Hey. Sophie here yet again. It’s Mother’s Day and Mom is taking the day off. She also says that since she was traveling all week and worked outside all day, she just doesn’t have the wherewithal to do her Bumblebee work. So, here I am.
Frankly, I’m starting to worry that Mom is getting too old for all this travel stuff. This morning, she woke up bright and early as always at 6:00 a.m. She had a couple cups of coffee while watching the birds, but no sooner had Dad ambled downstairs than she announced that she was going back to bed. I suppose she thought it was still nighttime because it was rainy, dark and windy outside.
It didn’t last long though.
“There’s too much to do!” she started complaining as soon as the sun came out.
To tell you the truth, I think she brings these things on herself. I mean, she could have asked Ben to mow the grass while she was gone, but noooooo. She says he doesn’t do it right. She says he mows the lawn with all the precision of a Navy barber. She would rather do it herself. And today being Mother’s Day and all, Dad announced that he had plans to “attempt a quiche” for dinner. Mom got this pained look on her face and immediately piped up that she thought she might like to make spanikopita (spinach pie), which Dad suddenly thought was a great idea. More work for Mom.
She was a little bit perturbed, however, that no one noticed the handy new garden cart she bought for herself needed assembly while she was gone. I hate to say this, but I’m not sure which is worse: Mom assembling things by following instructions or Dad assembling things by following instructions.
When Dad assembles things, he always shakes his head a lot and mumbles about things like “poor engineering design” and “design flaws.” Mom says he takes too much time reading directions and not enough time DOING things. And she says he uses all the wrong tools.
When Mom assembles things, she generally complains about the way the instructions are written and says bad words. Only now she’s trying not to say bad words so she says things like “dagnabbit,” “drat it all,” “what in the tarnashun!” and such. But she always pulls out ALL the power tools.
I generally think Mom is better at assembling things because she always had parts left over.
Tonight, Mom is trying to decide what to do with all the souvenirs she brought back from Graceland. She told Dad that she bought them as gifts, but I also see her eyeing her office to try and find room for them all. Honestly, I don’t know what gets into her sometimes.
In the meantime, I hope all you are ready for the coming onslaught of photos she has in store. She apparently took an amazing number of photos when she was “traveling on business.” Tough work that.
Until next time when Mom is tired,
Sophie
Robin
