the night the lights went out in georgia

When I was a little girl, I wanted to be Laura Ingalls. I wanted to ride around in a covered wagon and live in a little house on the prairie and roll down giant hills the way Melissa Gilbert did in the opening credits of the television show. Plus I really dug the outfits and the hairstyle.

But frankly, I’m not cut out for pioneer life. That was reinforced to me last night when we had a doozy of a storm and the power went out. For awhile I was all like, “ooh, I am a pioneer!” but once you’ve read by candlelight for awhile and eaten Pop-Tarts for dinner (the only thing I had in my apartment that didn’t require microwaving) then pioneer life becomes awfully dull. Plus, even Laura Ingalls had the ability to build a fire and Pa would have made some venison for dinner and then played the fiddle. They had it so much better than I did.

The power came back on around 4 a.m and I celebrated by turning on all my lights and my television and then turning them off and going back to bed! But I’ve been thinking about the olden times versus the modern times a lot today. I decided to take advantage of a program offered by BANK OF AMERICA, in which you show your BANK OF AMERICA debit or credit card at selected museums, and you get in for free. I am mentioning BANK OF AMERICA a lot in case they want to give me other things for free. One of the museums that was free with a BANK OF AMERICA card was the Fernbank Museum of Natural History so I headed over there.

One of the nice things about Fernbank is that they are probably one of the only places in Georgia that teaches what evolution is. But that can’t be immensely interesting for some of the little children who go there, because I heard a lot of parents saying, “let’s go, we’re going to take a ‘Walk Through Time in Georgia’” and the kid would just start wailing. But don’t worry small child, there are plenty of taxidermied animals for you to enjoy during a ‘Walk Through Time in Georgia.’

In this exhibit, it was hard for me to tell which was more ear-splitting: the artificial shrieks of all the birds that have lived in Georgia since time began or the conversations between parents and children, most of which went like this:
Parent: Do you see the bird?
Child: No, where?
Parent: Right there, the bird.
Child: What bird?
Parent: It’s right there, a bird. It’s red.
Child: Oh I saw that bird five minutes ago you fool. (starts crying)

Another interesting thing I observed about these parents and children was just how much the parents lied to the children. The parents brought their kids to a natural history museum and paid for their admission (unless, that is, they do trust their money to BANK OF AMERICA), probably hoping to teach the kid a little something. Then the child would ask a question, and instead of reading the text that accompanies the exhibits, the parent would just make something up. Not that I completely blame the parents. The kids were asking some dumbass questions.

If you stand just right, you can make the T-rex look like he's eating this thing!

If I understood the chronology of this exhibit correctly, then Coca-Cola predates the earliest humans!

After walking through time, I walked downstairs where there’s exhibit of ‘The World of Shells,’ which as far as I could tell, had audio narration performed by our 35th president, John F. Kennedy. I guess he did like sailing.

Then there was another exhibit about polar bears and penguins. The most exciting part of this exhibit for the children was a station where you could put on a little penguin costume and then go down a slide that looked like an ice floe. If you’re into education, I would say that this was proof that children learn by doing. I watched one little boy get all suited up like a penguin, and then he started begging his dad to watch him slide. But the dad was talking on a cell phone, making dinner reservations for the evening and asking detailed questions about the wine list. Based on the information he received, it looked like the family’s learning time was over. It was time to go try some wine.

I, meanwhile, continued to more exhibits. I looked at a giant dinosaur. Then I learned how we use our senses to perceive the natural world, and how cultural objects from around the world reveal a lot about the people they belong to. Lastly, I stopped by an exhibit on the “First Georgians.” Little is known about the first Georgians other than they had a canoe, they used spearpoints fashioned from rocks, they made tiny pieces of pottery, and like you, they might enjoy some of the delightful items available for purchase in the gift shop.

On the way back to the exit, I saw a small child licking elevator buttons. Clearly the modern world has loads more to offer than the prehistoric world.