What Stories Don't We Tell?

Ya’ll forgive me now because it’s day 3 and I’m pooped but I’ve been pondering something since the Peabody hotel….As we left the hotel, we notice a small room off the lobby filled with Peabody memorabilia. There’s a gorgeous old black and white photo of women in party dresses and men in tuxedos flanking long banquet tables brimming with china, crystal, and flowers. There’s a letter from a “war bride” sent in 2006 from a woman who, years ago, took two towels from the hotel. She said it was her life’s only regret and she wanted to set things right by sending $30 in cash. The cases feature lovely engraved silver bowls and other such things. Each of the items is carefully labeled with a descriptive card but we notice at least one thing that is not--an unframed photo that shows a long line of African-American men in waist-length butler’s jackets flanking the crimson carpet as the famous ducks waddle by. The ducks are clearly the subject of the photo.

Now, it may be that our group missed others, but in our observations, it is one of the few unframed photos of the bunch and one of the few things that doesn’t have a card explaining it. (Interestingly, it is also in the back of the case, partly hidden by two other photos.) Now, everything in the room seems so purposeful, so it seems unlikely that mistakes have been made. But, what does any of this mean, if anything? We’ll never know for sure, but we can certainly offer some sociological conjecture--just for fun. One idea our group suggested is that, symbolically, it seems that the hotel certainly doesn’t want to highlight the photo. And, perhaps by not offering an explanation, the hotel potentially offers multiple interpretations to the photo’s viewers. Maybe in an era when issues of race still seem hotly debated, this is a safe route to take. Who really knows, right? But it did get me thinking about this…what are the stories that we tell and what are the stories that don’t get told…in the crafting or re-telling of our lives/identities as individuals, as corporate entities, as cities, and as a nation?

This issue came up again when we visited Graceland later in the day and got a brief and cleaned up version of how Elvis died. Likewise, we heard no mention of the Monica Lewinsky scandal when we visited the Clinton Presidential Library in Little Rock on day 2. The potential impeachment of a president is no shining star on Clinton’s record, but by not mentioning it, it felt like a big elephant in the room that everyone sees but nobody mentions.

What’s the difference between the real and the ideal self/city/society? What lurks below the crafted image? What consequences can occur when we don’t give voice to truth? What is lost when we are not fully authentic?