Garden grouping with Autumn Joy sedum, red mandevilla, lavender, thyme, weeds, and little statue.
Bad news continues to pour out of the mountains. I have no idea how much is being broadcast on national or international news, but if you heard of Hurricane Katrina in 2005, you should be hearing about this. Here's one journalist's Twitter thread giving what I think is a plausible rundown of the situation. I've heard other similar reports, but from sources not clearly identified: "supposedly the sheriff of Banner Elk," things like that. But I've also heard from people I know, like Amy Jay, who homesteads with her family in the mountains above Boone, and whom I trust not to be hysterical if she doesn't have to be. Read her thread. Here is another thread from Amy, detailing an incident in her immediate area. Imagine those details multiplied over a large region, full of remote places (and yes, she's replying to a post that I couldn't see, apparently complaining about a cancelled football game at Liberty University, so there's anger directed that way, but again, just imagine the incident she describes, multiplied across a region . . .).
Anyway, yes. It's bad. I love these mountains, and so many of the places destroyed by this storm are familiar and dear to me. But those places are home to a lot of people, who I hope are surviving. I'm worried about friends in Black Mountain, which is in the Asheville blackout zone for cell phone communication, and about their family in Asheville itself. I'm worried about friends out in the country in our county, whom I've tried to contact and haven't heard from. We didn't get it as badly, but whatever weather we're having in town, they generally get a hugely magnified version of it where they are. If we get a little summer shower, they get a tornado. And they live on a creek. I'm not actively worried about their physical safety, but I am imagining that while we've gone merrily back to normal, not even a power outage, they're struggling in the aftermath.
Sooooo. Many prayer intentions to take with me to Mass today. I'm feeling heavy-hearted, in a week when one friend has received a cancer diagnosis, another has learned that her cancer (for which she's already had drastic surgeries that have left her unable to speak clearly) has spread to her bones, and yet another is in his last weeks, after an initial burst of optimism. More friends are suffering from ill health and precarious housing arrangements. There's just a lot of everything, even if none of it is happening directly to me. If one member of the Body suffers, the whole Body suffers, which is how it's supposed to be. Those of us who can think clearly, because we're not overwhelmed by our own suffering, have to do the work of sharing that burden, through our intercessions and through whatever (generally limited and paltry) material help we can offer.
When I know a reliable aid source accepting donations for relief in western North Carolina, I will post a link here. Those people will need all the help they can get, for a long, long time.
Our bishop has dispensed all the people of the Charlotte diocese, which covers the whole western region of the state, from their Sunday Mass obligation, but obviously there's no reason why we can't go, so we are. Leaving a little early in case there's any obstacle in the road, though I imagine that surely by now any downed trees would be off the highways around here. Still, we will go through the country, because we want to get a look at how things are farther afield in our own area, and you never know how it's going to be.
And today is Michaelmas, the Feast of the mighty archangel, whose protection we need, now and always. Here's a poem for the day (scroll down to the second one --- the first is an Advent poem), one of two that ran in Plough Quarterly a couple of years ago.
Wearing today:
*Secondhand Not Perfect Linen Mama dress (S) in Caffee Mocha, bought September 2024, last worn September 25. Second wear since purchase.
*Secondhand J.Jill linen-rayon longline cardigan, bought January or February 2023, last worn September 15.
*Secondhand Birkenstock Papillio wedges, bought September 2023, last worn September 15.
An all-secondhand outfit, which is nice. And despite the heaviness of my heart, I can still smile for pictures. Hair is a little wild and loose and flowing today, but I've decided that that's okay.
I continue to love the color of this dress, which is so indeterminate, yet so beautiful and fresh. I've gone with a fairly light palette today, except for my shoes, which add a note of contrast with my hemline, but I could just as easily wear navy or cobalt or pink or even cranberry red. I'm still on the lookout for a green cardigan to replace the old stretched-out cotton one I passed along last year, because I think green would be perfect with this color. Teal will work all right, but I'd like something a little closer to a true green, and a little more muted than that bright cardigan (which I do love and wear often). I'd love a soft green that would go well with my brown and Cinnamon Rose Leila dresses, as well as with most of my wool dresses. Something really warm and woolly, in a muted green . . . yeah. That would float my boat for the winter. Thinking about it.
But for now, off we go to pray.
EVENING UPDATE:
Husband is out cutting the grass while I make dinner --- currently simmering a pot of beef-and-black-bean chili, even though it's not cold out at all. The sun is shining, and the sky basically looks like this photo I took in the afternoon, out walking the dog:
Heard from my MFA thesis student for the semester, who lives west of us in a community that got hit harder by the storm than we did, that they do at least have cell service back at this point. I reassured her that whatever timeline she and the fiction program director worked out for thesis submissions was fine by me.
Getting a little hungry, so maybe I'll call the lawn-mowing husband in and serve that chili.