So Vermont is very similar to upstate New York in a lot of ways, but one way in which there is a vast difference is the sheer quantity of obelisks. I can fairly say that I have seen several hundred obeslisks in Vermont, and while I am the type of person who will take note of the existence of an obelisk when I happen across one, and I am furthermore the type of person who goes places where obelisks are more likely to be (i.e. purportedly haunted graveyards at midnight, weird art installations, privately owned museums devoted to wildly specific subject matter such as beads or covered bridges), I am not seeking out obelisks for the sake of seeing an obelisk. It should also be noted that I have those same interests regardless of location, but it is only in Vermont that my takeaway has been “This state is lousy with obelisks.” So, keeping that in mind, I hope you’ll accept my admittedly unscientific conclusion that, for whatever reason, Vermont has a high density of obelisks. For example, here’s a picture I took at the birthplace of the mormon prophet Joseph Smith.
A. They don’t even have the balls to call it an obelisk.
B. In order to avoid calling it an obelisk, they inexplicably opted for “polished granite shaft,” which you know they were aware would immediately make the casual reader’s mind leap directly to dick jokes, but were probably too afraid of being called immoral to point out as grounds to just go with “obelisk.”
Anyway, I want to talk about Bennington. Here’s a photo taken from a hillside on the outskirts of Bennington. Tell me if anything stands out to you.
One time my best friend Kal and I stopped at the Vermont Welcome Center just outside Bennington to use the restroom, and there was a very friendly volunteer inside ready and extremely eager to give us Vermont facts. I asked about the enormous fucking obelisk dominating the landscape just beyond us, and was met with an apologetic insistence that he really didn’t know anything about the obelisk, but that we should definitely visit it. “You can go inside it.” He advised us. “There’s stairs in there. You should really. Go. See. It.”
We’ve both played way too much D&D to follow a suspiciously friendly and conveniently ignorant NPC’s direction to enter an obelisk, so we obviously skipped that side quest. But the threat still lingers.
I was in a public facility in Bennington last week, and I noticed that there appeared to be a wall display made by the local elementary school students, which crudely depicted the obelisk through the medium of fingerpaints and construction paper. “Oh,” I said slyly to my guide, “So the kids are learning about the obelisk.”
“Oh, I really don’t know.” She responded quickly. “I don’t know anything about that.” When I returned to the facility earlier this week, the display had vanished, replaced by a construction paper Christmas tree of the exact dimensions required to conceal a large pictorial representation of an obelisk.
Here’s another strange thing: even though the obelisk obviously dominates Bennington’s landscape, I have absolutely no concept of where it is. I have, in fact, only spotted the obelisk once while in Bennington proper, and it prompted this post. As I was driving back to work from my meeting the other day, I made the same turn onto the same street I’ve made a dozen times before. This time, I was caught off guard. I actually gasped. “Now where in the fuck did you come from!?” I exclaimed, addressing the enormous obelisk that had abruptly and unprecedentedly lurched into view.
It has not answered my question yet, but I feel a strange yearning in my soul of late. I should really go see the obelisk one of these days. I should really. Go. See. It.
Okay, so I was in Bennington again recently and I genuinely intended to drive up close to take some funny pictures for this post. I really did. I took note of where it was on the horizon as I drove in, so that I could swing by on my way back.
I should further note that I am much like a crow in that I devise games to play with myself when I’m bored. As such, I decided that looking up the exact directions to the thing would be cheating, but I still felt generally confident that I could get close enough to figure it out.
Nope. It wasn’t where I had triangulated AT ALL. I was off by miles?
My new theory is that it slowly revolves around Bennington like a reverse sundial.
Okay
I have to confess something
I’ve been sitting on this for a few weeks because at the time it just didn’t seem so
I didn’t know
Like
I could not have fucking known what would
...
I TOUCHED IT OKAY I’M SORRY I TOUCHED IT I FOUND IT AND I TOUCHED IT AND IF I COULD TAKE IT BACK I WOULD, IS THAT WHAT YOU WANT TO HEAR
I touched it
I
I swear Plattsburgh, NY is just Vermont light, because it to is obsessed with obelisks. One of which you can also climb to the top of.
