This week, I had the opportunity to visit Mount Vernon, Washington's great estate.
Family lore has it that we were once
Cohee Virginia farmers (a couple of whom may have
served under Washington himself), so I always indulge in a moment of false nostalgia when visiting the lush, rolling hills of this state. I will say that whenever I visit this part of the country, I do start to notice people who share my own features or general cast of face. One also begins to detect a shift not only in the social texture (it's such a pleasure to dust off and flex my "pleases" and "thank yous"), but also in the texture and velocity of speech: the twangs always bring to mind childhood memories of my older relations, all of whom are gone now.
Everything is in full bloom in Virginia at the moment, possibly as much as three weeks ahead of the plants in New Jersey. Driving south in mid-Spring is a kind of time travel. Enjoy it while you can.
My primary interest in places like Mt Vernon is how the people related to the natural settings that sustained and defined them. I've always been fascinated with how people use living things around them to enhance their pleasures and comforts, and Mount Vernon abounds in such examples--some of which are having a rebirth, and feel rather timely. Fruit trees are everywhere,
espaliered and cordoned to bear more fruit per branch than they otherwise might. These fruit trees were originally trained onto rail fences that have long since rotted away, and now serve as
living fences, themselves. Small branches are woven into
animal pens, or stuck vertically into the ground to serve as pea trellises. There's a deft grace to such things that I cannot resist. Equally pleasurable are the conversations with, say, a woodsman on why a tulip tree's wood grain is too twisted to make
good rails for fences, or perhaps with a blacksmith about the differences between blueberry iron and bog iron, and why one oxidizes faster than the other. The hours fly swiftly for me, but the minutes must surely drag on for anyone else within earshot.
As spectacular as the grounds are, I've always found Washington's house to be something of a letdown. Like
John Bartram's wonderful house, it's something of an architectural oddity, with its spidery windows and delicate cuppola, which gives it a crisp silhouette. As much as I love
Washington's Georgian-style orangery/greenhouse, the Old Man's house gives the impression of an
eighteenth-century McMansion. The grandiose setting and the sprawling layout is part of why this may be the case, but what really gives one this distinct impression is this: the skin of the house is not stone or brick, but wood carved into stone brick form, covered in an early kind of white stucco veneer. I've never come across this feature in any other building dating to this period, and from what I can tell, it seems to be a singular example (this is the part where this rank amateur is avalanched with other examples). While I marvel at the novelty of such an unusual architectural feature, I'm more apt to imagine it on a home owned by a brash, brilliant striver like Hamilton. Such an anxious gesture seems beneath a man of Washington's stature. One would imagine him favoring something dignified and understated like plain Flemish bond brick or white clapboard: materials befitting an American Cincinnatus. Maybe this provides us with a rare insight into the private Washington? One is tempted to wax French and liken the house's grand, brittle facade to Washington's false teeth, epaulets, and wigs--but a hard smack cures one of such notions.
To be sure, Washington's house epitomizes a suite of eminently American traits, but for my money, Jefferson's
Monticello is far more tasteful and inviting. Monticello is not merely a curiosity, but a gem: it's modest in scale, considered in its proportions, nestled in its landscape, and every nook displays an eclectic charm and inventiveness. If Mount Vernon is a vulgar McMansion, Monticello is more akin to that truly elegant American innovation, the Craftsman bungalow. When comparing the two houses, it's clear that most Americans today tend to follow Washington's lead in such matters, rather than Jefferson's. Both are quintessentially American, but given my druthers, I prefer the American qualities expressed in Monticello.
One last impression: the visitor's center and gift shop, with its Washington bobbleheads and refrigerator magnets in the shape of the Founding Father's false teeth, is every bit as hilarious as it is horrific: its vulgarity and color is fitting, and a place should be made for it, even in our most revered civic shrines. It's who we are. However, my own flip attitude towards this commercialized Pop-Washngtoniana has its limits. At the risk of seeming like an overly reverent, earnest prig, I found it sad watching the ball-capped throngs crowding into the noisy exhibit-cum-themepark ride that trivializes Washington's life with videos and cheap movie soundtrack violin sweeps, while the adjacent museum with its incredible artifacts and its air of quiet dignity barely had a single soul in it.
A fork in the path has been presented, and for good or ill,
the way forward seems to have been chosen. For the moment, we are afforded the luxury of a choice, but who knows how much longer we have until we're all in line for Washington's 3D Virtual Cherry Tree Log Flume.
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