So, by the end of this last fall semester, it is clear to me that I’m suffering from too much of a good thing. I am, however, absorbed by the title of “Discourse” by Niccolo Machiavelli. According to him, in order for something to survive, it is essential that it frequently be restored to its original principles. In my frame of reference, that means Mississippi Delta Blues. I make plans to go to the Delta over the Christmas break.
When I mention my plans to a friend, she replies, “Ah hah! Going up to the Crossroads to see your old friend?” Legend has it that Robert Johnson, foundational Delta Blues guitarist, made a deal with the devil in order to master his style. He supposedly did this at the Crossroads, the place where earth and sky meet. “Cute,” I think and yet … it is an intriguing theme.
As a faculty member, it pleases me to think that I’m helping students develop their talents and yet, that happens to be risky business. The list of people who destroyed themselves in the process of self-improvement is impressive. Now, whether there really is such a thing as the devil is a question for the religious studies department. I’m more interested in the question posed by the story. What kinds of chances do we take on the road to success?
After turning in the grades, I head up Highway 61 out of Vicksburg, Miss. WMPR is playing a gospel song, “The Devil Don’t Like When I’m Blessed Like That.” I cross over the Yazoo and into the Delta on a steel framed bridge. Now the radio is playing Robert Johnson’s “Traveling Riverside Blues.” Johnson sings, “Well, I’m going down to Rosedale, Rider by my side.”
I’m trying to get to Greenville, but I wind up in Arcola. Somebody switched the signs. On my way back, I pass a grisly auto accident at the point where the signs were switched. At the tourist center in Greenville, the woman is quick to recommend the Native American ceremonial mounds outside of town, north on Highway 1, in Winterville. Sounds promising.
The next morning, I’m there. Rosedale is only a few miles up the road. I walk carefully around the ceremonial mounds. Do earth and sky meet here? Maybe. The light seems right. The woman in charge of the sight engages me in an unusually existential conversation and assures me that human life is fragile. Given the reports coming in about the tsunami over the radio, I’m inclined to give her a hearing. What’s in Rosedale, I ask. Tamales, she says. A woman named Mary makes them. The subject of another Robert Johnson song, I think. The opening lines are, “Got Tamales and they’re red hot, and she’s got ’em for sale.”
Rosedale is bigger than I thought. A sign greets me on Main Street. “Re-Elect Carey ‘Dinkey’ Estes, Mayor.” I walk into a combination restaurant-service station where anything that can be fried has been. I ask about the tamales, “Jeanette!” the lady behind the counter says, “Show him where the tamales are!” She points down the street to a white washed building with a sign, “Joe’s Tamales.”
I open the screen door at Joe’s. I say hello to a lady whom I assume to be Mary. How many would I like, she asks. Well, let me see them, I say. She opens a large pot. The tamales are tied together in bundles of three. Let me try a bundle. According to the Johnson song, “Now they’re two for a nickel, four for a dime. I’d like to sell you more, but they ain’t none ‘a mine.” The ones Mary sells are two dollars a bundle. I sit down at a table. She sits down at another. The tamales are perfect. We talk, about the Delta, about the Blues, about tamales and wonder why they are a Delta food. We can only guess.
After graduating from college, Mary lived in Chicago for 35 years before coming home to run her brother’s stand. He had died about three weeks ago. The stand was his dream. He would give her instructions from his hospital bed on what to do. She wants to keep it going. I tell her I hope to see her next year. Is this the Crossroads, I wonder? If it is, I can’t find any evil in it. I find a good woman who loves her family and her home. So, where does that leave my pursuit? Well, next year, I tell myself, I’ll drive up to Clarksdale. That’s further on up the road. The phrase also happens to be the title of another famous blues song by Bobbie Bland, but that’s another story.
Roger White is an assistant professor of political science and Faculty Coordinator of Academic Advising at City College.
