REMEMBERING PARADISE GARDEN - A DESTINATION AND A JOURNEY

(Please enjoy another excerpt from ONE WRONG TURN AT A TIME, my humor book-in-progress that chronicles adventures I’ve shared with my other half as we’ve trekked all 50 states as a couple. This piece dates back to a day trip we took as young parents to three littles. As the saying goes, the days are long but the years are short. And so, too, were many of our trips back then.)

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~ Spring 1992. House poor but rich with family (translation: we had three kids), our travel adventures kept us close to home. Sometimes on sunny Saturdays, we’d pack up Old Gray, the Ford Taurus wagon that moved us safely from Colorado to Georgia the previous year, and hit the road to explore. That’s how we came to venture to Paradise Garden, home to folk artist Howard Finster and his massive collection of work.

I might not have even heard of the Reverend Howard Finster if not for my sister, Lynne, an art teacher and collector. Finster, whom some call the Andy Warhol of the South, was a former Baptist preacher turned self-taught artist. Before his death in 2001, he produced 46,991 pieces of art, often of angels or pop culture icons or historical figures. “Commissioned by God,” he handwrote a faith-laced message on each piece of art, all individually numbered.

A master of many trades, Finster also created a 2.5-acre art environment as a home to his collection of sculptures and repurposed items. Paradise Garden is located in Summerville, Georgia, north of Rome but south of Cloudland Canyon State Park.

Back in ’92, I owned one of Finster’s painted cats. So why not visit his garden?

Primed for adventure, we headed toward Summerville, hoping that signs would lead the way to Finster’s place. No such luck. And this was back in the days before Google and everyday access to the Internet.

No worries, though. Finster was famous. Certainly, someone could help us along the way.

We stopped at McDonald’s for lunch and to ask for directions. The clerk had not heard of the Reverend Finster.

Rice groused under his breath, something about chasing unicorns, I think.

Undeterred, I asked again, this time at a gas station.

The young attendant pointed. “I think it’s back toward the penitentiary.”

Um…, Lynne hadn’t mentioned a penitentiary. But I pushed aside any anxious thoughts to let my excitement shine through. Rice pursed his lips but agreed to keep going, instructing Alex and me to stay on the lookout for signs to the penitentiary.

The good news? The said penitentiary turned out to be the Chattooga County Jail.

The bad news? We soon determined we were driving in circles—or rather, one big square block along a rural road of small ranch houses dotting large lots. I tried not to pout as Rice pulled into a driveway to turn around.

And now for the worst news. Rice cut the turn short.

Poor Old Gray was now stuck on a jagged old drainpipe connecting the driveway and the ditch. Rice tried to rock the car back and forth, which didn’t help get her unstuck.  Nor did it comfort those of us not in the driver’s seat.

Daniel started to cry. (Sorry to narc you out, Dan, but you were little and understandably scared.) I walked the kids across the street to a vast green field, partly as a distraction but also to get them away from their father. To be fair, Rice is not the family cusser. He leaves that to me. At that moment, though, he was letting some mighty colorful language rip.

What happened next unfurled like a dream, except it was real. It happened.

A lady drove up to Old Gray on some fancy tractor-powered lawnmower. Pink slippers peeked out beneath her flowing blue muumuu. Daniel began to quiet, watching his dad and the lady hook Old Gray to the trailer and prepare her for tow.

Success followed. And at the exact instant Old Gray steadied her way back onto the road, the girls squealed, “We found a four-leaf clover!”

Of course, they swore their discovery brought us a change of luck.

Maybe.

But I think perhaps that pink-slippered lady was really an angel. She did get us back on the road and provide some spot-on directions to Paradise Garden, where we spent hours exploring. The place really escapes description except to say that it’s creepy and amazing. And unforgettable.

Almost as unforgettable as our 1992 journey to get there.

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