Small Town Topics

I was born and raised in a small community in Northwest Georgia. There were stories told in the hallways of our high school about two devil worshippers who lived way out in the boonies at a place named Corpsewood Manor. Now, I was quite the scardy cat back then and wanted no part of going up there, devil worshippers or not. I grew up in the country and knew all too well how dark it gets when the sun goes down, but this place was so isolated it made my neck of the woods seem like downtown Atlanta. I frankly found many other things to occupy my time rather than head up to that desolate place to meet two strangers who were basically hermits. I wouldn't have gone if you told me one of them was Jesus and the other was John the Baptist. The location of the house was enough to extinguish my interests; I really could have cared less about their religious beliefs.

As most anyone who lives in a small town would be I was interested in the stories I heard. Not interested enough to visit—remember this is me:

When I was a sophomore in high school the two men who built and lived in Corpsewood were brutally murdered by two young men. I do remember having a deep desire to attend the trial when it took place but if my memory serves me correctly I was still a senior in high school and couldn't get out of school. If it had been skipping to go get some fast food and ride around town I would have leaped into the car but I was either not bold enough or stupid enough to skip school and head to the court house.

Today as I was glancing across FB I noticed that one of my friends had become a fan of Corpsewood Manor. I must admit that I found myself engrossed in the posts when I clicked over to check the page out. Before you hurry on over to the Corpsewood page let me clarify the reason I was so spellboundby the posts I found. These murders took place almost 30 years ago. That is a very important fact to remember. Reading those posts was kind of like watching a train wreck. You know you probably don't want to watch, probably shouldn't watch but just can't bring yourself to turn away. I guess I wasn't surprised by the drama that was taking place on this FB page. There isn't a lot to do in that small town—less to do now than when I was growing up. But people please!!! Surely there has to be something better than arguing on FB about whether or not you had ever been to Corpsewood, knew the victims, or was "kin" to the men that committed the crime. I don't want to sound insensitive to the tragedy of two people losing their lives, two young men that will forever pay for the decision and actions they committed in such a brief moment of their lives, or the loss that the families of each of these men will forever experience but this happened 30 years ago and it is all you have to talk about. I really can't decide how I feel about the things I read. Part of me is deeply saddened by the fact that things in that small town have not changed. At the same time I find it amusing that these people cannot see the irony in the fact that they get offended when someone says something to them that they just said about someone else. They sure can dish it out but can't take it when it is turned the other way. That is so often the case. We are quick to judge and reprimand others but are enraged when someone questions us on an issue. The funniest part of it all is that most of them claim to have been friends of the victims and were frequent guests of the men. I wonder why none of them seem to know each other? It seems to me that with all the visiting that was taking place somebody should have crossed paths on occasion. Several of them say that they graduated around the same time that I did but I can't remember most of them. Maybe they were foreign exchange students. Hey, as a matter of fact one of them looked a lot like that flaxen-haired Japanese homecoming queen. I always wondered what happened to that girl. Hmmmmm.