There are days where you just want to disappear.
“Chattanooga is a made up place.”
No it’s not – I live there….Where did you hear about Chattanooga?
“It’s some made up place on the internet.”
St John had turned into a love/hate relationship. The island was absolutely gorgeous. We weren’t exactly making friends by putting down addresses though. For those of you just tuning in – I spent three months trying to address houses in the US Virgin Islands. One thing that struck me was how easy it was to leave an island. I spent the days fantasizing in between hikes up and down hills about walking up to a boat and handing them a suitcase full of cash and saying “Take me anywhere but here“. I toss my phone in the water. Smash my computer. I jokingly told several friends if I disappeared they would receive a postcard in 7 years with the phrase “The pigeon flies at midnight” scrawled on it just to let them know I wasn’t completely dead.
One day a lady walked up to me and said “You guys are all over the internet down here – people know you are here”. I was actually happy that was occurring. People saw us and they knew why we were there and what we were doing.
One day another lady walked up and said “You guys are scaring the hell out of all my friends. They came down here to get away and you’re giving them an address. They don’t want to be found. An address means they can be found.”
One night at a bar the waitress found out what we were doing “…yeah – I got a driver’s license so I just made up an address because I don’t have one – I picked one out of a movie”. I didn’t ask what movie.
Finally I ended up on a road with no name in front of a truck that had been converted into a restaurant. I excitedly told the owners what we were doing and why we were there. A resident behind me spoke up. “You better do what he says – he’s from the Lieutenant Governors Office. You better pick out a street name – if you don’t they gonna call this street something stupid like Chattanooga Street”.
I turned around and asked “Chattanooga? Where’s that?“. I eventually pulled my drivers license out of my pocket and showed her that as much as I would like to pretend at times it is made up – it’s not.
I rounded the corner and got freaked out a little because I hadn’t told a lot of people where I was from. Word travels fast in a small town though. I had no doubt after that people were watching me. It was nice in some ways. Not so nice in others. I am cursed with an overactive imagination. I actually wondered if people would follow me given the chance. No one ever did. As much as people believe I want to stick out there are many times I don’t. A few times I would wander off – go for a short hike and disappear. Not seeing people for an hour was comforting. Pretending that I could disappear was doubly so.
So one Sunday morning at 6 am I sat with the ghosts in a Sugar Mill Plantation on the north end of St John.
