HeartHome
Thinking of Western NC, Resilience, and Beauty
I moved out of Western North Carolina in 2006 after college, landing not too far away in Chattanooga, Tennessee. But the mountains never let go of your heart. I’m over there all the time—visiting family and friends, or hiking and exploring the corner of Appalachia closer to where I live now.
It is, in Wendell Berry’s phrase, my “home country,” the place I know backward and forward, where my sense of direction is keenest, to which my sense of history and connectedness to the terrain, water, flora, and fauna is most attuned.
This past week has been unfathomably hard to watch unfold. I’m thankful my family still in NC are safe (if still with questionable temporary road access and without power and Internet access apart from sketchy cell signal), but seeing the news all week has been hard. The loss of life. The remaking of landscapes. Whole communities wiped off the map. Like watching a loved one suffer when you can’t be with them.
At the same time, I’m so encouraged by what I’ve seen of the community spirit of this place pulling hope from disaster. The lists of places to give and serve cropping up. Creative ways of reaching those in need. Churches stepping up to front-line service. International organizations bringing field-tested relief supplies into hard-hit communities.
This resilience is powerful, so much so that it’s often highlighted as a key “trait” of Appalachian communities. I’ve even waxed poetically about it myself.
Nothing goes to waste here long in this possible land.
The world may use and pass you by, but this too is a gift,
Holding our gaze inside a simpler horizon.
On instagram last week, I shared some thoughts on this at another level, likening this rebounding recovery to a mushroom:
As I watched the news come in and prayed for the rain (that I'd prayed to come) to stop, I walked around the yard. There, in the midst of withered plants struggling to absorb newfound moisture, was the first mushroom I've seen since spring. It was waiting, ready to spring to action from a hidden wealth of strength and vitality.
As the mountains and the people who live in and love them take stock and begin to rebuild, I know we'll see a constant, coursing strength bubble forth—community spirit, resourcefulness, creativity, and tough-tender love of place.
May it be so. May it be so.
This is still my prayer, but today, I’m tired of seeing photos of destruction. I know we need to see and not look away, but I also want to look farther back into the wonder of this good and beautiful land, and forward to its restoration. This, too, is resilience. Beauty is medicine, and the world carries within it the hope of new growth.
May it be so.
