We left Atlanta on Saturday morning, heading south toward Milledgeville. Before we entered town, we took a right off the highway at the sign for Andalusia. This was the farm where Flannery O'Connor wrote her books and raised her peacocks. On my only other visit to Milledgeville, in 1991 to write about the town's preparation for the Summer Olympics (it hosted the badminton teams), I had driven out to Andalusia but there was no sign then and the gate was locked. I contemplated climbing over the fence but didn't think the headline "Travel Writer Arrested for Trespassing" would have been good for my career. But who knows?
Now the farm is open to the public, though this Saturday things were a little hectic as preparations were underway for the bluegrass festival that afternoon. We parked in the back and, walking in, were met by a young man wearing a sea-foam colored T-shirt bearing a sketched portrait of Flannery O'Connor. We watched the short film and examined the pictures on the walls. A woman wearing the same T-shirt asked me my favorite O'Connor story. I said, rather predictably, A Good Man Is Hard to Find, but added that my favorite book of hers is The Habit of Being, the collection of her funny and stoic letters.
I asked if any peacocks were still around, and the woman told me there was a pea hen; the last peacock was killed, I think she said by a racoon. She pointed out the pecan trees; a number of the letters end with Flannery promising to send a present of pecans to friends up north. I stood a long while looking into her bedroom on the first floor and trying to imagine her typing away. Before we left I bought a T-shirt.
Downtown was as small-town lovely as I remembered it, with clothes stores and antique shops and a bakery and an ice cream parlor. We had lunch at a Greek restaurant, served by a handsome young man majoring in English at Georgia College in town. A nurse, sitting at the bar with her father, told us she worked in a neighboring town but wouldn't leave Milledgeville.
After lunch we walked to the bakery where I bought a pecan cookie.
