Contending with the weather

  In the mountains communications are just as important as equipment.  Road closures are vital information effecting work days and decisions about everything from child birth to sports.  Scattered "community" functions as independent and part of the American standard.  It's a challenging proving ground.  

We ended up calling it

  Ye Olde Pumphouse that couldn't anymore.  We'd mustered and rallied and multiplied into groups; we'd volunteered and took paying work, and shared the relief.  Us young people were swapped between states, T'see and NC to fortify "strong".  We'd also trained initial self-righteous Don't Tread On Me into To Be Rather Than To Seem.  Through learning--book and experiential--we'd gained in levels and certifications and through "community" not bailing on place (when we couldn't get along) we'd all upped our game as Americans.

  There was learning curve and distinctions between able and hey, can I get some help over here.  The disaster at that time brought us to know ourselves and others better.  It also brought new baseline and fresh technology and technique.  Based on field experience academics and the other professions brought some human touches back to an increasingly digital world.

  Some of us were with some local tradespeople covered in slime and lacking nutrition and rest but never giving up by the time we got to the pumphouse.  We used whatever we had left in our supplies to try and repair a cracked housing.  The watery sludge just kept coming out and coming out.  We were so tired our lower halves were like lead as the water broke past electrical tape, bondo, bungy cord and a sock.  We'd reached the end of helping but had committed to leaving no one behind as we went forth.

  A contractor finally arrived and looked blankly at the situation.  Went to his truck, put on hip waders, came back with a wrench as big as a small rifle, and asked us to peel the layers of "repairs".  One layer even included some laundry line holding a St. Joseph prayer card to the cracked casing.  A sort of reverse convoy of every kind of professional started to go by out on the street interspersed with compact energy-efficient cars handing out final Ready To Eats.  And the blessed Safety Keepers who'd helped city and country navigate the tangle of us destroyed by weather were letting people know....

  Time to move forward

She wore her boots the whole time.

   Our educational leaders were sometimes comical in digging deep for what had been imprinted on them in order to weigh if that was the best way to proceed.  One guy would pause, tap his head like Poohbear, recollect, then dive into relaying the way forward or vigorously shake his head and wheeze, that's not gonna work this time.  Others were challenged by colleagues to Okay, do that but do it creatively.  The word creative was as stressful to some as using a firearm.  One new mama, self-proclaimed 'not creative', tied breakthroughs in personal creative technique to counseling, but was still shy about letting others see her creativity.

  "Susan" The hoarse whisper was a mixture of tone--frantic, demanding.  The moon had disappeared from fingernail to new/none visible.  Susan didn't answer.  Other girls and women bumped into eachother as they came off the walking path and clustered on the edge of a campsite.  

    Susan stood just near a lit-inside dome tent and put down a garbage bag.  She began to undress to her bathing suit.  The whisper screeched, "OH MY GOD, Susan!"

    Inside the dome tent five people were huddled as if the tent were a life raft at sea.  Assessing the day.  In getting "real" from training into field assessing the day included the good, bad, and ugly on what all had happened in the twenty-four hour cycle.  All of us had had to gear into 24/7 mode because we had troops overseas.  "He said that?"

  "Uh, yeah.  Then the other team lead "suggested" that we should know how just in case NOT because the government had become an inefficient whore of a bitch stingy ass too cheap to get us fuel."

  "Kelly," she roused at her name.  Someone swayed her knee cap back and forth so her hand automatically started swaying the person's next to her.  "Here.  Present and accounted for Officer," she said sleepily.  A person across from her replied, "Looks like we're nearing a lighthouse" and crouched closer to Kelly to check pupils with a pen flashlight.  Someone else asked, "Did you hear we might have to burn our shit as fuel?"

  Kelly smiled dreamily.  "Well, I hope it's frozen first."

  Susan's's brown boots and gray wool socks looked blobbish in the night vision goggles until a team lead adjusted the set (goggles and battery pack) like binoculars. We never called that person Hands right out loud.  A red laser light flashed into the sky, then in an instant forty laser lights shown on a woman in a bathing suit from every direction.  

  A person in a scuba suit ambled towards her.  "Why Mr. Aquaman, so funny to see you here this time of day."

  Did you say it's Tuesday?  The man's voice then asked Susan to find two sticks, Depends on what you're going to do with them. "I'm not, you are."

  "Can't you state your intended purpose for the two sticks?"

  Silence.

  "Please Andrew, we are wasting time."

  "I can't hear a damned thing until you use two sticks to open the sides of this headgear," he snarled.

  Susan knelt, kept the flashlight trained on his nose, and groped around on the ground with her free hand.  The strewn kindling wood proved rotty and she was almost backing into the tent by the time she found one strong enough stick and a tent stake.  Andrew raised his eyebrows and furrowed his brow as she came towards him warning, Okay I'm coming in.

  "Right where my laugh lines are, ooooo, lower, sort of above my ear, like

  "I can't see your ears dork

  "Like a pencil behind my ear."

  She winced.  He chuckled.

  "THERE!" She put the flashlight in her mouth and leaned back to gauge symmetry.  The flashlight hit on a gleam and a sparkle.

  "What the?"

  "Fridge."

  "What?"

  "You work on getting us a fridge." He took the flashlight out of her mouth and pulled the wedged headgear shut.  He shone the beam on the garbage bag.  "Should I ask?"

  Susan snatched the flashlight back and let her arms fall to her sides.  A movie scene would show bare and booted foot, people putting the cinch on despair.  A creek bubbling and rumbling rocks into resettling.  And Susan explaining, "A crazy idea really."

  He listened.

  The streams of political teansition and turnover of the economy had propelled people from sandbagging and ditch digging through chaos to surface.  A new generation of adults were stepping up.  But the old guard was

  "A different breed."

  "Yeah."

  "Why a bag of mud?"

  "Aw shucks.  This gets at it.  I put a clump of homesoil in the bag all week every time one of those bastards cut a young person down.".

  He sighed.

  "I held my tongue and held my tongue and felt all the dreams and energy we'd shown up with like melt into a migraine.  Like there's no bridge between free will and life, living, and rules and regulations."

  "Well, it is a training phase for most people."

  "So anyway," Susan shown the light on the girls and women huddled around a tea light on a can top, "I thought I'd come down here, cover myself in mud, and say my prayers."

  "Can I watch?"

  She made a firm face against saying no.  "In theory, as God takes away my stress the clumps will fall offa me."

  Andrew grabbed her arm and pulled her towards the little path/road.  The tent door was being jiggled and the zipper pulled at somewhat roughly.  "MY GAWD!  WHAT DUD YOU PEOPLE EAT???!"

  

  

  

A way up

   I got to take a drive, a way up, to Swan Cabin.  Currently there's a big tree down on its driveway, but the path through The Forest is clear amd in decent shape.  This time of season it's more bear hunting with hounds than hikers.  The hounds and the people are seriously quiet as they study the environs.  The dogs do seem to get excited when they are driven up to other dog carrying vehicles--like workers noting familiar team or "new guy".  The splendor of hoar frosted mountain tops--glinting sun catchers is balanced with listening for cracking, sliding, and stirring among the forest life.

  Young creature antlers rest against good scratching trees.  Debated are tree bark disturbances: animal or chain?  Higher elevations bring chance to understand better stuff like the drying effects of sun over a period of time on materials like tree trunk and plastics.  Evidences of trash and campfire speak to passers through.  It's fascinating to read forest and woods.

Season of miraculous caring

   Even when somebody doesn't know we are caring, we still can and this gives life like baby Jesus coming to his earth family!  God was continuing a life-giving tradition in sending his Only Son to them and us.

The big red balls are festive!.

    But the meteor shower last night was exciting.  Some stars just poofed out, but some were like bolts of lightening.

 

Word du jour --

   Continuity

  Especially in times of great political transition here in the United States of America it is community that harbors cultural memory and bears the torch of continuity.

  In the Southeast people braved the stigma of heritage to retain family connection.  Some of the Confederate flags we see flying are about that.  About confronting an at-times contentious past and the continuity of values.

  All over the world continuity has become key to how we survive aging population and revolution.

It won't be long

  now before the Stecoah Artisan Gallery closes for winter for a break between seasons.  This weekend (Dec. 7,8/24) is Breakfast With Santa, holiday shopping for arts, crafts, and goodies at Stecoah's Christmas in the Mountains and the Christmas Cantata.

  At the Gallery Open House on December 17th, 2024 the Stecoah Artisan Gallery will be open longer than usual for late holiday shopping: 10am-7pm.

  And on the 12th of December at 5:30pm there will be a Winter Recital by JAM--Junior Appalachian Musicians.

  Kids in pajamas and Christmas color outfits came to see Mr. and Mrs. Claus this morning!  Pancakes and sausage and goodie bags abound.

  Plus I had the chance to talk with local artist Melinda Jester Donaldson.  Her impressive array of art goods speaks of her talent and willingness to try different materials to paint on and woodburn.  She explains of a walking stick adorned with basket-weave pattern and feathers that she harvests her own wood from her property.  And for this particular stick she researched what particular Native American feathers were part of custom.  She uses a handmade Japanese tool to peel the bark, triple sands, and polyeurethanes each walking stick.  

  She also paints in oils, water color, oil pastel, and acyrilic ink.  The acrylic ink dries fast, can be layered, and has vibrant colors.  It's more subued coloring that blends with the piece of oak that is done in acrylic and woodburning.

  Until now I hadn't met anyone who paints on two easels at the same time.  Melinda explains this keeps the color palette the same in different paintings.  I also hadn't seen dynamic water sport acrylics.  Wow!  A kayaker in action paddling in a wallop of whitewater.

  Melinda has done photographic potraiture of pets and people, murals (like on the bottom of a pool in one instance), and puts Scripture on leftover building materials/found objects.  She likes to do stuff even while watching football.  Like painting flowers atop poured paintings.  And adding layers to artworks to give them dimension.  

  She does teaching of art as well.  All ages.  Says to people, "If you can write your name, I can teach you art." She's taught at Stecoah, Tapoco Lodge, and Art Explorations in Bryson City.

  On a visit to family Heather Sharp, owner of Imperfect Perfections, tends the goodies for holiday cheer.  "Home-made, from scratch!  Cakes, cookies, pies, cheesecakes, cupcakes, and more" treats extravaganza!

  About a decade ago Heather made a 60th birthday cake for her stepdad and discovered a satisfaction in treat-making.  While working another job she's built up her baking skills.  The Stecoah Christmas in the Mountains festival is a three-table event and it's a lot of detailed work.  From home before traveling Heather decides what to bring based on what's sold well in the past, the holiday, and customizing for the crowd (sugar-free, kids, pets).

  Then she gets to baking!  Working in a small kitchen from eye-catching recipes she employs strategy.  Cookies cooling while packaging baked and chocolate treats.  Decorating, perfecting not just flavor but presentation.  Gift-worthy foodstuffs fill her tables.  Festively drizzled and adorned pretzel sticks, ricekrispy sticking stuffers, ginger snap truffles, candied pecans, and brownies.  Allergy warnings are clearly posted.  And assorted treats displayed in windowed boxes alight the hopes for merriness.  Even her pieces of cake are extra-ordinary with frosting painted into holiday dogs.  The peppermint merengues invite in small packaging.  And the possibilities are punctuated with sweet potato and pecan pies.

  Heather's Auntie Mabel Smith has been making jewelry since she was eleven years old.  When she was little she'd visit with neighbors on Cape Cod who were an artistic couple.  The lady made jewelry and her husband was a painter.  Mabel first learned beading, then more intricate beading, then the differences in materials such as stones and metals.

  At Stecoah some of her jewelry is sparkly and could be sitting among such finery at a department store.  And some is bright colors, gypsy whimsical.  Beads and stones delicately wound and blended with silvers and golds.  Dream catchers and windchimes round out the gifts on this trip to Christmas in the Mountains at Stecoah.

  The work on the mountain up 143 is astounding!  Not sure of all the technical terms, but they are fortifying and retaining walling parts of steep mountain top terrain.  

  Some of us had told others some things and others of us had told some other things.  The pressure was intense.  And as we went along our counselors and parents were giving us the best advice they could, but we were the new generation of young adults and stepping into field and career.

  As people were gathering around a campfire after a ten-day solo the shy people hung back.  "Barely recognized you," a black girl said.  "Oh, hi." 

  "You been okay?"

  "Sort of yes, sort of no, but essentially yes."

  "I see."

  "Do you get what's going on here?!?" A nerdy guy demanded of another guy.

  "In principle yes, but

  "You guys seen, oh, there she is

  "With him

  "With with or just with?"

  A couple of discussion moderators came out of the bathroom.  Someone went right over to get a worksheet.  On it were overlap topics, stuff like, broad heading: nature...science/creativity; culture...ethnicity/locale.

  "Don't come near me!"

  "Why????"

  "I smell."

  Nobody else said anything.  But a health-minded person whispered, I wonder if she got raped.  A person standing close by mitten-whacked the whisperer.  "I should not have let you come to that group."

  "It ruined me."

  "Well, compared to the superwashed I smell."

  "Ain't no superwashed here honey." 

  "Girl, don't give away state secrets." 

  "I will if I want to."

  "Good point.  Has anyone showered in the ten days?  And if so, where?"

  He got shoved toward a picnic table.  A clipboard and stringed pen with ruled paper were there with some styrofoam cups.  This was an exercise akin to scaling rock wall or crossing a desert for most of the people wrastling natural talents, life learning and experience, and a desire to be involved with forest community.  Some people who'd worked in human resource jobs and academia had encouraged "the fringe" or "wilderness professionals" to think about "programming".

  What's that mean?  Someone had almost tearfully asked.  In the political change up and tier-levelings per budget changes more than a few people were at forks in the road.  People who'd been working in the fields--medical, communications, veterinary, technical vocations--hadn't had time and resources to "upgrade" position based on coursework and credits.  And people in work in all the industries did not want to lose standing.  Amongst baby boomers there was a veritable landslide of confusion about best paths and practices.

  And us young people were coming on board too!

  "Got to ride out and check sites!" A freckled guy said of his week.

  "I got to work with a Marshall.  How cool is that?"

  "What'd you do?" The black girl (who'd told us to call her that) asked.

  "Camp chores and fireline training, and, and

  "Speak up sweetie

  "Writing."

  "She, the fabulous black girl, is a poet!"  A guy in draping layers of clothes sashay'd past and pointed like he was a spotlight.

  "Really?  I thought you studied sociology."

  Before we could keep talking a booming voiced person was requiring us to meet the "fern family" and the "saps".  An impressive array of vegetation in dirt atop garbage bags was put on the table.

Snow flew

   In colder climes people say, sometimes bark, Get that done before the snow flies.  And while the ground is not totally frozen.

  It snowed last night about a quarter of an inch where I'm camped.  The rhododendron leaves were spry in the sunshine yesterday but droopy this morning.  A quieting sky still thick with bottom-shadow grays trails across blue sky.  It's before the "dead of winter" so the people I've been talking to are still working through carekeep details and necessarily adaptive plans.

  Simblings are being twined and pines bundled.  Spreading holiday cheer is right up among priorities now.

  At the Robbinsville library I happened into hearing from Hubert Merchant all about the Friends of the Library puzzle mission.  He and his buddies assemble puzzles and have them framed as artwork.  They're very thoughtful about which puzzles might could go where in town.  A Mickey Mouse assemblage fits perfectly in the children's library.  A pop art iconic-type puzzle may fit great in a new establishment nearby.

  The thrift shops are bedazzled with Christmas.  And the dollar stores have a mix of seasonal items and gifts.  Most of the gas station/convenience stores still have basic fishing gear.  And most every outlet open to the public is sporting brochures and local business cards.

  Angels and snowflakes blink high above road slush and mud.  And work is still being done way up on the mountain highway between Stecoah and Robbinsville.  The portable stop signs and piloting of traffic-thru is heightening our safety awareness.

  Currently the hours at Lovin Equipment & Sales, Inc.'s FARM AND GARDEN CENTER are:

  Mon-Fri 8:00-5:30

  Saturdays 8:00-1:00

  Closed on Sundays

  They've got a sundry of practical gear for communications, hunting, animal tending, work clothes, gardening aids, project wire, adhesives, fasteners, tarps, landscape tools, animal control remedy suggestions, canning equipment, pool care accessories, trash maintenance, grilling and grassing, birding, and some specialty tools for barning and farming.

Tel. 828-479-4177

   Tired turkey syndrome?  What's that, like tuckered out turkies running away from being dinner?  I think it's something similar to melatonin the stuff that makes u sleepy after eating turkey.

  And recreationlinks.org reminds to watch out for getting hypothermia!  A partnerships literature tells of colder water in mountain streams which can facilitate a rapid lowering of your body's "core" temp.

  And the U.S. Forest Service gives us a great update in this article.  Of special importance is the emphasis on partnerships.  It's through alliances that most of the funding and shared resourcing occurs.

  Sometimes the Department of the Interior puts subcategories of workers into, like, safe storage as it aligns as a workforce.

  There's a cool article in Light & Seed, Summer/Fall 2024 about "comprehensive ecological restoration of the wildfire-prone landscape".  It's actually a field report called "A Fire Knows No Bounds" by Lisa Jhung.  And in it she encounters the situation of private landowners with holdings near National Forest.  Programs and foundations can forge partnerships and profoundly shape regions.  It can be just the success story needed as people take a break from more heated coalition politics.  Usually the people involved learn each others' languages for the same issues and there's know-how to come up with solution.

  In a story by Elisabeth Kwak-Hefferan titled: "A Tale of Two Coal States: What happens to coal-dependent communities when the coal goes away? A lot depends on whether their state government is reality-based" (Sierra, Spring 2024), the author and photgrapher look at places (specifically in Colorado and Montana) that are in transitions.  The article does a good job of breaking apart complex issue and tying the basics of surviving seismic shift in broader industry to personal/group efforts.  In the U.S. we are also experiencing the growth of smaller nuclear power sources.

  Elisabeth brings up the point that, "Morale in the community plummeted." Thirty years ago we'd read similar news of people in layoffs and changes due to shifts in global economy.  So as we were training in our chosen field-directions we kept that understanding front and center.  It was part of being anti-complacent which was also core value in service work--private and national.  And it was our opportunity to shape the future's heritage as professionals and community members.

  The article also talks about how the same place can be different "place" to different people.  A place can be within broader place and still be its own place.

   Happy Thanksgiving

Yeah, visiting brings that up.

   Sometimes when we visit some place we are essentially peering in or glancing.  Travel definitely added this dimension to our lives.  There's a powerful poem by TS Eliot (sp?) where the consciousness is encountering "a scene" in the passing.

  In the passing it's difficult if not impossible to detail, to fully understand scene.  While the imagery may be stark (being filed past a Confederate flag on a highway, for example) the other attributes of such scenery is bereft of information.

  Thirty years ago in the Southeast there were many people working on boundary and how we navigate less isolation or a nearness to each other when we all have individual ideas and beliefs within the broader framework of nation.  Generations of family were explained by representatives when it came to talking about flags.  And academics and communities came up with honoring everyone's space about flags using the word heritage.

To me, the best

part of Thanksgiving is the marching bands.  Those ones in the Macy's parade are mountains!

Whenever

  I get back from camping alone I do have feelings of I hate you all equally.  I just do.

  I have to go through an un-solacing process.  My own.

  And in highly political years I weigh things on my mental scales.  The love and care that us poor people have for people and place has to measure up to the fictitious cold stone statue of "the Republicans".  That was how I found out that there are real people Republicans of every ilk.

Cooking the competition's food,

   No can do, a rule man was explaining to a wounded, crying a little woman who'd come to donate what she could ayudar, to help.

  The gentle giant of a rule man tried to pantomime please, don't cry, stop crying, then barked for a little help here please.  His trousers were still covered in red mud slid into browns we aren't used to describing.  A translator stood between the country eggs moving and all parties and partners and said exactly, please, don't cry, stop crying, in perfect-pace Indian.  

  Why?

  Why not?

  Suddenly the translator was like a traffic cop.  Stopping the conversations long enough to stall what may have been sales-on-the-sly or may have been good will.  Explaining time to feed our own families mommy and any food sales require licensing.

  It reminded me of working in grocery and learning why the CDC and health inspectors (especially with wonky FDA going on) have had to supersleuth which came first, the chicken or the egg.

  Adding to their stress was other peoples' stress about paying the bills and so, example: working 24 hours as couples/units of money gatherers.  It wasn't helping anyone's health to share without sanitizing and sterilizing, some health-minded people were mass-explaining about caretending and psychology.  Transfer, I explained about one company's ingredients--powdered--being in a competitor's overhead.

  Ooooooh.  Each person in the group gathered around possible resources processed the new information.

  Back then we even had to consult with engineers at a true standard sawmill about the sizes and pricing of lumber.

Deep dark auburns of oak leaves

   line some ridges below.  Like colorful contour lines to the seas of pine greens.  This year even in December the trees offer a splendor you just can't find in a city.  But the miles and miles also fill the eyes with trees like wreckage.  Big, old trees, shallow earth too saturated, toppled during and after Hurricane Helene.  Piles of trees carried down hills and waterways.  Tree-crushed vehicles and structures.  The mind can't wander away from the devastation.

  Relief centers take donations and serve locals affected and volunteers and workers with water and pantry food.  The Cajun Navy in a walmart parking lot is a pop up civilization point.  It's there that the heavy, dark and chunky with icy air cold front slams in.  Cardboard from pallets of water and dirt get caught in the gusts.  Mild air is blasted away like the cold front is a leaf blower.  Seasonal nature calling.

  Long marred as a ground filter to atmospheric rivers of air pollution the giant heads of mountains are bereft of trees now.  The few that were standing are laying like blown out birthday candles on a soil surface that really does look more like the moon.  In breaks of cloud the sun blares the truth.  Exhaust-ed sentry trees are charcoal in color on some of the just lower mountains.  Whatever comes from sky up here soaks into this filter of ground.  Some of it looks like creme brulee with crevices carving new ravine eventually.

  Dump trucks en route to gravel pits and dirt stores rumble over mostly two lane country-mountain roads even as soft shoulders calve and asphalt bulges and cracks.  Twisty mountain passes are undermined and in spots lost to lower ground.  Hairpin turns between ledge and many hundreds of feet of below.  Ravines crammed with debris.

  The ups and downs of traveling in East Tennessee and Western North Carolina somehow mirror where we've been politically as a nation.  As do the many hashtagCountystrongs.

  The AM radio in Cocke County is the radio I miss when I am anywhere else.  Especially in disaster, like WRAL in NC, the people stick with it round the clock and keep community not only informed but on the mend.  They announce things people have to swap and sell; report the sports; play good music; give updates on public safety and events to get excited about.

  The food at CANCUN Mexican restaurant can't be beat.  And speaking of food, be supercareful about eating deermeat right now.  A lot of the dead animals you see along the roads have been poisoned.  

  Reading a helpful for our region article from a magazine called Trout.  "Mettawee Reconnection" by Mark Taylor (Spring 2024).  And when I can get to it I'll post some materials from the NC Forest Service.

  From the road the Mt. Mitchell golf course where it is visible is badly damaged.  And up into Madison County the two month later (Asheville just got it's water back) damage to "downtowns", severe.

The force of water

  even in higher elevations rumbled trees, entire trees, along creeks.  Up by Mt. Mitchell State Park and Micaville High School where homes and service buildings are nestled in varying elevation trees up higher than level surfaces came down.  Onto wires and shelters trees came down.  Old Glory's still flying up here!  And in the mix of policy and loophole--wild west--of Newport TN, I did hear about eligible bachelors and meat bingo.  A lot of people stuff is just the same.  And the work on soggy and dry rot and polluted continues!  A lot of area in and around Asheville is considered "toxic" still so be careful.

The moon had risen

  in a wash of cloud that squished it unperfectly round.  Skunk made his rounds undisturbed by the campers.  

  The poorer than poor kamp talk sputtered into that campfire space between resilience and giving up.  Still breathing so I'm guessing work in the a.m.?!  A man drying feet asked and told his woman.  Same as yesterday?  Or today?  Days are already blurring.

  Speaking of AM, did you guys hear on WLIK that I think it's Memphis is having a, like a sanctuary day?  Working with a church or something to help people sort through the whole criminal v just broke paperwork.

  Makes a big difference this time of year.

  Oh, this is normal?  I thought it was just, like, political change.

  That too I'm sure.

  None of it's gonna help me fix my roof.

    The small fire crackled, makeshift hearth.  We'd gotten some notebooks and were looking over budgets and trying to figure how people come up with $9000 just for heating and air.  We'd calmed down some from being chased and people we didn't even know had helped spread the word, they're not even Jewish or Iranistanians.  One guy tried to compliment by asking if we were sex slaves.

  I don't have sex for money.

  I do.  It's called marriage.

  I'm going over to bed.  You come home tonight 'stead a making extra money out there.  The man waved a cruddy boot in the direction of the road.

  We were girls.

  Eyes searched each others' faces sternly before a kiss.  Us girls looked at each other sternly too.  We stay put.  Agreed.

  It's never extra, the lady in the sweater assured.

  Extra?

  Money dear.  No such thing as extra.  Ever.

  It's the same back home.

  And where is that?

  One girl punched another's leg.  Ooowwwah Minnesota.

  Minnesota huh?  So this weather isn't real cold to you?

  No m'am.  I been in snow so deep it was like, like

  Like?

  Like totally deep.

  Good, you're an experienced survivalist.

  Sortah.

  You'll be fine with this one bundle of wood then, for the three days.  It wasn't a question.

  You still a virgin?  A gruff voice called into the tarped area.

  Then another man came crashing up the creek bank.  Who's he?  The gruff voice asked.

  A Native American, tracker.  Gonna help with the lumber stuff.

  That weird beetle thang?  A skinny guy in a leather jacket stuck his head out of the tarped area and asked.  Up from Panther Creek?  He also asked but we couldn't hear the answer.

  Go to sleep girls.  The mountains are, she made quote marks in the air, "under God" again.  Then the lady in the sweater left.  But a biker woman came back from the shower and sat near the fire.  Steam came off her hair.

   America is unique in our ways of capitalism putting people on their own for quality of life, and together on some things like safety.  We didn't start out helpimg each other with money but we did start out helping each other in service to God and to Country.

30 years ago

  People had to stop blaming overall shitty situation on each other, so the States could work independently and together.  Fear breeds fear and that ruins business and keeps abusers able to dominate as we're all overworking and are basically trapped financially.

  It was back then, for example, a woman named Lisa explained that sex trafficking is not fake news.  And we outed abuse of surveillance in hunting people.

  Got through it!  Stay positive.

  We were young but there were children younger, so we got sucked into the make it a good day vibe.  Problem was we needed the help of real journalists!  And when we reached some M-F 9-5, they were like

  Well, journalism is fact-based, they needed evidence or at least "a strong lead" to even go out on a beat which people had stopped doing pretty much.  We finally caught back up with mentors and trusted older-than-us's.  We hadn't meant to run but what happened was, well, it had to do with racism and data thievery.  Some people we had met camping were in various states of service in foreign military stuff.  And the American political stuff kicked up old hatreds plus a fighting of their wars here.  So it was kind of scary.  And we thought we were imagining it, but realized people were hunting people.  Not American law enforcement.  They assured a bunch of us, they don't "hunt" people.  Not even when they are after bad people.  Different communities worked together to help the law enforcement get back to normal.

A diversity of character

 and point of view.  Now get in the cabinet.  All with the same mission to shore up a proper baseline of America.  It's great.

  Especially as the West is already, technically, engaged in real warring, all countries sift through best for the task at hand.

  It's interesting how we have to think right now, before things are formed into what they might be in subsequent phases of working on the country.  An example is the vaccines.  No one would keep good medicine from a fellow countryman, however when the "healthcare" "system" is all over the place, there's too much danger to say yes "this" is good and right.  We went through this as a body politic with "aspirin" and came through the initial fears and arguments with a better handle on what's good for people, how there's generally good, but also specific body types, how enemies had hands in products, services, policy, and "poisons".  Pre-new it's really good to analyze where things went.

  Even homeopaths and curandarismos let people rest first, to see what is really wrong with someone.  Sometimes stress and weather is compounding the challenge of our immune systems to get healthy.

Not weird, yet

   Usually they talk about UFO's as filler...long time 'til January 2025.  And buffer.  The world and its space debris goes on no matter who's where.  Of course, people gave Obama the benefit of the doubt (no weirdness going on) but wars complicated the roles of diplomats.  Kerry not selling but giving permission to the axis country Iran to go ahead and have nukes (if y'all can get them), that was pretty weird.  But it was weird in that cabinets are supposed to maintain loyalty like the military leaves no one behind.  So then there was questioning of Obama and the Democrats' motives.  But, we were in war.  Things can get complicated but aiding the enemy is treason or something, some most serious crime.

  In a ruckus it's difficult to pin blame, so post ruckus there's a lot of finger pointing.

Back up in Knoxville

  I'm sure I look as thrilled, not as Trump getting back to the roost of the White House.

  A homeless lady tells me she's pretty good about pooing in a container that can go in the trash.  But most of the homeless here pee and poo wherever, and throw the needles wherever.  It's that part of the cycle where people with no money are endangering the whole of us, so keep your pets safe!

  I was lucky to find some affordable hand sanitzer at one of the gas stations.  And where I camped was clean and gated.  Did get bit by a tick.  Felt like a bee sting.  And got red rashy the next day.  Changes to environment like the flooding moves lots of stuff around, and "pests" and petu-lence beefs up its own take back a place.  Some places couldn't recover ground gains after Covid.  So that's another reason to promote landscaping.  It'll be a busy spring.

  Cha, u can imagine our tee-shirts, something like 379whatever, we pee and poo everywhere

  Great.

  I did hear that; some of the US sanctuary cities have community action groups with info about options depending on which direction you are taking your life.  Of course as the nation phases total law and order back in, the police on the whole do not want for violence either.  So one foot in front of the other....

  Guy at the pop up Trump store said something interesting when I was buying an AMERICANS FOR TRUMP bumpersticker.  Said people are afraid.  A lot of people may be.  And it takes really repairing trust to get each other through that.  So here we go again like 30 years ago.

  Plus we're tighter than tight wallet in a transition like this out of necessity.

True colors

  I'm sure you've seen them.  Everybody's got colors besides cammo and red, white, and blue.  Just like every human is more than skin color!  That message has been going around since the 1980's when some punks got pissed off about something.  About somebody calling a mawmaw an old blue hair, I think.  They got pissed off so they dyed their hair some different colors and put their feelings into music.  Some suit said, I'm not voting for you, in an Australian accent, and the punks worked their response to that right into the lyrics.  Music AND performance art, take that.  We don't need no stinkin' patches.

  Yep, political cycles leave a lot of bruises no matter who all is campaigning to manage the money.  And managing the money is really the bottomline even though the whole gamut of lifestyle, American lifestyle, has shown its true colors.

America's already great.

   A couple nights good sleep free from political noise and the sentiment is settle back down.  Slogans come and go.  So do transitions and shifts.  

  At the clean and still drying out from Helene--like all the mountain areas--Triple Creek Campground (open 'til December 1st) the atmosphere is late season mellow.  Spacious parking for what all we're hauling for change of season.  And well kept grounds make tenting a breeze.  Affordable.  And the office is very welcoming.

  Hot cup of coffee at Janice's Diner where a lot of locals eat early.  Too early for me to start asking, for you what would make America great again?

  I imagine the answers would be as varied as us Americans are.  And our journies to achieving great also diverse.

I'm a sucker for

  high gloss paper magazine stock, so of all the brochures, this one caught my eye, Discover Cocke County, Vol 5, 2024.  A downtown turbocharged with coffee and cars; foothills nature; people history even older than the Revolutionary War; real people doing the business of America in the ads; a creamery -- as in ice cream, all the flavors are great smiling faces assure; MEAT!!!! at the Hillbilly's Smoky Mountain Diner (Texas-style fare like BBQ and sauces to go), and axe-throwing!  All in Newport, TN.  Forget about Disney.  Put Dollywood on hold!

  Them there's fightin' words, I'm sure.

  I81 to 77 adds hours to crossing between T'see and Carolina.

  Trump won all seven battleground states (flipping six), won a huge popular vote, Republicans won 53 Senate Seats, and the votes for the House are still being counted, radio tells.  A rest area hosts OVERSIZE LOAD labeled vehicles.  Even before sunrise traffic slowly but surely rolls onto the highway.

  It's Veteran's Day.

  The blue holiday lights line the fence between parking lot and world on the move.  A lifesize statue of a soldier stands ground and always salutes an enormous Old Glory.  Trucks parked in rows start to come to life, parking lights, head lights, tail lights....a quiet nod to another work day.

  A framed write-up on a woman cook for Ihop is amongst the articles and photographs of honored people, professionals, at the travel center.  She's had the job for 33 years!  And also values spending time with family and friends.  Even cold, the next morning, the country fried steak and hashbrowns melt in the mouth.  A school bus's yellow flashing lights blink in stark contrast to the mist and low cloud foggy weather.

  The bond market is closed for Veteran's Day, the radio relays.  Across from a giant Davy Crockett (whose birthplace is not far from here) is the Baileyton Antique Mall.  Antique Mall is printed on the tin roof so even barnstormers can locate themselves in the landscape of homeland.

  TVs at dinner last night served up tough talk, a truck carrying 46,000 pounds (or pieces) of apple crash, and war stuff.  The vague beyond the fringe does and does not have specifics attached just yet.  A man on the radio explains nations taking roles in holding other nations accountable, de-escalating destruction to peace & prosperity, and people living the values of "peace through strength".  An overall feeling "in the streets," as they call popular people, is that we'll all be safer when the wagons are circled.

  As governments transition the stage metaphor loses appeal for people in a real defensive position about transparency and strategy.

  At a pop-up Trump Store a worker is bemoaning the late arrival of potential stocking stuffers.  He takes his time to explain forty five dash forty seven.  Been to dozens of rallies, including July's shots fired and Trump hit rally where nobody ran.  Little cardboard Trumps show the man with an authentic smile.  No doubt about "winner" and currently in the standard process of picking loyal people to stand with him and the Republicans migrating back into managing the country.

  A billboard advertises a selection of 6500 bolts of fabric and mountain farmland makes its own sort of living Americana quilt.  Rolled hay and handpainted sign: Eat More Turkey jogs memories of how we make this work now that the competition-proper is over.  In America's heartland--all over the country, city and nature-preserving places--we buy, sell, and trade!  It's staple to hospitality.

  My next stop is the Roadside Station~Garden & Gift.  The lady is closed on Sundays and Mondays, but kindly finds out if there's something she could help me with.  Wishes for a good day to each other and I'm on my way.

  My days off from work are special no matter what I'm doing but to drive through our country makes my days booocoooo special.  Soaking up memories of family and life 'cuz I have thinkin' time.  I remember driving mama around and meeting lots of people in seasonal transition.  Budget-minded people, work and play schedule-ing people, people who think ahead to grandchildren and future people still needing to tend to where we live.  Taking stand now so we can live how we want to live in a future world.

  And then there are the animals.  Me and mama had not had country time in a while and it was almost shocking to learn anew about the crazy steed.  "We need more meat," a stout-lipped farmer type relayed of where he was representing.  The girl steeds were stuck somewhere else and the tensions were building.  "Are those bulls humping that hill?"  Someone drinking spiked ice tea asked.  A glance.  "Guess so." A cell phone call, They'rah ready.

  Hot, dark roast at the Seven Brew Drive Thru Coffee.  We are stacked up on the Tennessee side to savor.  A road sign lets us know these commercial/businesses are in a Main Street zone.  The sun peeks through broken cloud and the mountains show themselves.

Seventy-eight

   The paint was starting to peel off the fire hydrants as our peoples' movement to celebrate 200 years of surviving the experiment of USA became reality v red, white, and blue image of us.  There was some disappointment that the symbolic couldn't do it for us.

  One brother picked finger grips into a Nerf football.  Dad couldn't believe his hand was still that small.  Mom handed the ball back to the older brother and said, Deal with it, you're not getting another one until Christmas.  The boy took in the order to deal with it, then grinned because realized, less than six months.  

  Mom put Dad's hand on her expecting tummy beneath fashion that didn't reveal healthier than over the past few years, so, more prayers for you Sherry, the note had read.  And, we're off to California.  I voted for "touch", hopefully everyone has fun.  The guests were prepared to hold the line on a fun day.  Cool.

  I ran towards a neighbor's Dad so happy to see him but stopped myself short of leaping into his arms like the Victory Day photograph.  "Thought you people went to California," my Dad said.  "Well, the Mrs. did." This war is far from over, others had said talking late into the night.

  Some of the neighborhood girls were borrowing Mama's jewelry to wear.  She wanted to know the why of each pick.  Kept up with all the news and used a proverbial fly swatter on gossip.  She herself that day put a thoughtful selection of pieces in one of her pockets.  And then asked me which piece she should wear first.  I gazed at the collection gathered from thrift store and holiday gifts and thought about the past.  Since you're the hostess of this worldly event, small world afterall, supposed to have a fun day in spite of all the evil, let's see....I dramatically took my time picking and then whispered the why to her.  "Sounds complicatedly simple.  I like it."

  They'd been thwarting us at every turn.  Haters of the Old Glory.  Haters of selves, that's what a lot of druggies are.  Haters of law and order.  Freakish twists and turns in everyday life because of, well because for every plan to be good and do good, horrible people were able to organize.  Done in the dark was a phrase equally applicable to any "fringe" activity since we all had to battle evil in a straighten up and fly right position.

  It wasn't all bad, people had good days.  Groups within being good citizen groups had particular flavor from strict to laid back.  Then the criminals would make moves and we'd have to snap into action.  Sometimes the police and communities had total safety going on and schools could honestly present amazing little people.  Other times, at least near cities, it was really warlike.

  Some blamed it on "the Asian war", brought home all the tumult and couldn't shake it, some.  But the drug availability kept re-starting fires that people'd just barely survive.  And when there wasn't drugs, there was lots of booze.  Smoking and liquor.  And so many people never getting ahead or getting settled and then losing it one way or another.  The politics were fire and ice between neighbors and family because the politics were point blank about upholding beliefs and owning space to live those beliefs.  Middle grounds weren't faring well.

It's not "fake"

  I think we all go through that feeling, sometimes alone and sometimes together.

  Of course it's compounded by our abilities to produce, create, fabricate.

  I think it's also why people find something like the Ten Commandments a worthy thing, standard, for self and country.

  You've probably had that feeling in church or at a family meal-- where something feels fake, like the formal aspect of situation isn't revealing of the whole truth...maybe a messy house until the Wednesday before Thanksgiving, or everybody got drunk on Friday night.  Part of the astounding innovation that Jesus brought to the structure of religion and way of life is forgiveness.

  Believe me, there have been times people called me stupid 'cuz I did something stupid.  If the shoe fits, somebody else tough didn't cave on holding people to the standard.  Okay, okay, that was stupid.

  In America we're allowed to do stupid?

  Life is NOT some neatly FORMAL thing¡!

  You can hear our struggle in our Rock and Roll and in the spaces between the curtains of "the stage".  And that's not fake either...the external to self world is like a stage.  Even if there's no other people around when we consider ourselves under God or as people in relation to "a higher power".

  It's always been part of the fight in taking an anti-war stance.  Warring appears to change the standard(s).  And when more and more people get on that bandwagon the standard stands less of a chance to exist.

  America is often the voice that says no.  We're not doing that.

  But there have also been times when we're all over the place in terms of upholding our standards.  Then we have to get to the church of the Constitution and look to each other to get out of the mudhole.

When the Hungarian woman called me stupid

  I had to wait the whole seminar-class time to get affirmation that I am not stupid.

  It was just...

  Well...

  Fallaci explained sore subject, analogies...warped...like wars, political phases get named afterwards or by others.

  I think it's that United States of America that many of us voted for...the one that battled out World War II to establish freedom from a real tyrant or two plus a tidal wave of hate and confusion.  Ironically, we elected a sometimes foul-mouthed cranky type to stand up for us, for all of us.

  

  It was also more than thirty years ago.  At the time we were in a checkmate cold war with Russia so the two number ones -- chief amongst Allies, head of the orbit that was soviet union/Axis -- were like in a wrestling match.  And for most of the world it was a horrifying prospect, to talk about there, wherever it was.

  Besides fighting tooth and nail over how to understand politics and violence, how to talk about stuff/not talk about stuff, there were a lot of unknowns.  Even the scholarship about fascism was kept under wraps, and many scholars walked a razor thin wire between saying and not saying.  Gets into censorship and safety, violence and war, journalism as not fake news and sometimes too hot to print.

Like a vigil

  for our votes to be more real than the bitterness.

  At a rest area a truck bears wound.  The signage along the side reads:

  SUPPORT OUR TROOPS: WE WILL NEVER (ripped out) and shows the American flag.

  We will never forget was also a group response to our nation under attack, to hate displayed in violence.  

  The majority is not into it.

Most of the Middle East

   doesn't give people choice.  The choice to have a job or work, for example.

  In the U.S. we get to the same point with automation.  And we choose everytime.  Stay a human-being centered nation, or

  Leave it to precision warfare

  Leave it to the robots

  It's hard on us workers because we feel robotic, more so sometimes than other times.

Remember how

  the Milwaukee returns were not as quick as some others?  It's correlated to "affordable housing" and other community action movement--which is not necessarily socialism.  Needing affordability on food, clothing, and shelter is not socialism.

  Affordability is something the baby boomers have always demanded, if only by sheer numbers if not by choice--I'm not paying thirty dollars for a piece of plastic (storage bin).

  And, in a weird way affordabilty had to do with January 6th.

  Way back when we had a group discussion around

  Defending democracy in relation to property law

  It also got into the fifty shades of grey surrounding a flag and what the flag represents ideologically and in actuality.

  I'm still refresher course-ing The Case Against Socialism before I can get back into Arendt.

Scrimmaging selves

  We'll have to get to thinking about this war of the egos that's getting called facism.

  A lot of people have no cause to have done any service to nation, USA.  So, no idea about being a part of something that's not necessarily creepy.

  And, when I felt like the whole humanities fellowship at the University of Hartford should also study about facism, especially in relation to our image as all of us in football gear emblazoned with USA, USA...a beautiful, intelligent, hardworking woman from Hungary had to explain why she said that was stupid and even saying the word facism is like saying the word holocaust.

  It's never accidental.  It's not like Trump's gonna fall through a trap door that socialism left behind in DC and become a fascist.  And the antidote to as much socialism, marxism, and war that's got our flag gnarled up in the political spectrum is to be more American.

  Sigh of relief.

  At this point in these long-winded conversations with passports in hand many of us chose to talk lightly with questions like, Is the Pioneer Woman really a pioneer???  And, ever been to Disney?????

  In other words, when the popular conscience gets dragged into heavy issues like war and who should live and who should be killed--as a matter of politics--there's a divide between what to talk about at dinner for everyone and what might be better digested in levels of "schooling".

Buncha wounded political animals

   I blame the socialism creep.  Not Bernie, of course, but socialism/communism more general.

  Back then we were also a mix of ilk.

  Our friend Christian had a proverbial whip to break down the last of the sediment of "political" so we could just feel human again.  And in doing that people participated more freely or at will.  Some chose not to.  This is not China.  That's baseline.

  I guess the whip which never touched anyone was a more effective prop than gavel in judgment-free zone.  And it was Asheville, so there was a lot of "smudging" going on.

  Not so strange for the word healing to come out of Trump's mouth.  Certainly lots to heal up.

  Well, of course the older people are cranky.  Just chits to the democrats!  And a lot of them with no companionship whatsoever in those places.

  Critical, critical everyone's got opinion especially because we've all got votes!

  We move on.  Non-violently; that is what a peaceful transfer of power really is.  The grievances mount to the moon but the best anyone can do is move forward.

  Gosh, I remember being a young white kid and the election rollercoaster of emotions coming to a plateau.  It may have been Denzel Washington who did a voice like Sipsy in the movie Fried Green Tomatoes.  Point was, buck up.  It takes longer than 48 hours for the stocks to go go and the trickle to sputter to life.  It's not like there aren't 1000 little things to tend to.  It's not like the cozy middle America has to get uncomfortable.

  Boy did we cry though about the horrors that had happened.

  And, what about, what about we carried on.  Our bleeding heart liberal emotions had us emotionally worn out, then angry--at socialism.  And then to find out, more work, more work....

  Felt like dreams crushed.  The just a bit olders in the Holston camps put on their best black ladies and redneck "dads" as characters.  They'd imitate us blubbering, too hard, life's too hard, then character act the toughest, most caring people they'd met.

  Do you think the Republican dictators should just make the hand-to-mouthers slaves?????

  Course it was real black women and men that had somehow survived in the real world who brought the play-acting into the realm of real conversation.  In Knoxville we did all that with an element of art and "pizazz".

  Around here there'd been family members--white, black, and purple who'd gone without to hold onto properties.  And neighbors who picked casseroles up off the ground when helping hands were turned away because of color and flavor of religion.  While the north's election cycle mood thawed pretty quickly, the south made some pretty icy barriers as boundary against "the circus".

  But hos-pit-ality is part of good business, women business owners stayed in place and rather tearfully explained, not really understanding all the loaded in tensions about accusations of stealing, or being told how to look now.  A lot of their men were having to travel farther and farther as sales went into region phases, and budgets were so like leaky dams team leaders had to physically bring stuff from one location to another so as not to waste and to make pennies but profit.  Then be so careful about reinvesting the profit into sustaining the businesses.

  No safety net.

  Not much margin for error.

  Be careful!!!!  Comes out of the manager's pocket and no manager, no store, no restaurant!  My God, be careful!

  Not "just an onion ring".  We were learning a lot of stuff for the first time while also trying to heal up loved ones from such a long bout with socialism running us into the ground.

  Some people didn't want to start partying again.  And some people stayed away from businesses because would rather say nothing at all.  Others scrounged sofa chamge to help people get a house cleaning or carpentry odd job done.  People felt funky.

  Yeah, we did see that onion ring as symbolic of the whole business!  None of us was perfect but together we could make a successful business and so each of us was successful.

  We did that in graduate school.  "You" don't want to stick to the script?????!!!! Jeeeeeeez, it's 7AM and you're coming at my friends like you're a missile.  Okay, you write it!  You write what you will say...load up the powerpoint with your genius phrases!  Turned out to be a great practice which helped people develop their own thoughts and navigate defending thesis.  Some people had never seen their thoughts externalized.  Even some people with great stature.

  Cha.  Some future world leaders cared to take on the practice!  It matters especially when/as real world happens more quickly and by a kind of ongoing conference call.  And practicing lets people ask people...how did you hear that?  Of course, some interdisciplinary students realized they can issue orders to some of the people they speak at, but there are others they want to reach but can't force.

  I was really glad to see an authentic smile on Trump the other night.  It's that authentic happy people want me doing my life's work smile that every American should get as we turn this around.

  

Ice chips!

  Thirty years ago when the hospital in Asheville didn't have clean ice chips for the suffering, loved ones and caring practicioners brought ice cream machines and bottled water!  It was around the time Israel got more into de-salting water.  And recycling, re-purposing was gaining in strength to offset "trickle down".

  It was a big story.  Because it brought up "issues" about divisions between people regarding resources and overcoming types/categories/-isms.  And overcoming bias with caring was ground-moving in the old south.

  It was the start of WNC's exceptional health care network.

Out of subjective and into the frying pan

  In journalism we long ago "got into it" regarding perspective and reality.  In anthropology some of the same debates quietly raged.  Over the years people seem to have used perspective like a tool.  Argument about perspective seems to have taken center stage to issues of omission and other manipulations of "news" and so what all we're doing.  We, on the whole, for example, got better at knowing the difference between PR and reality of situation.

  It's interesting that at the end of an administration on the hill but before a new one has arrived the "news" is full of perspective and opinion.  Both chock full of bias and even some wild imaginings.  Some of that is true about us and some of it is conjecture.

  Hearing from a random sampling of Mexicans, for example, to media-tab Trump's personality as "unpredictable" really speaks more to some other things than it does Trump's personality.  There's political strategy for instance, rarely discussed like a futbol team's game plan.  There's also all of America in a state of jostling, maybe repositioning, around "issue".  Before a democracy comes to resolution about anything there's a lot of bluster and analysis and landing technique. There's difference and discussion.  In America this really does checkmate dictatorship.  And there's always revelations regarding who pay dat?!

  The sources of funding are just as important in equasion with "policy" and law...though "credit" and willy-nilly printing of dollars has affected that reality.  

  During times like this a lot of issues--stuff in the pile of working on--gets called "crisis" but very often the crisis part comes from like getting people elected and walking away; a sort of disengagement instead of working through the reality of situation.

We've got cardboard Dolly!

  Like in that movie Twister...we've got cow in the debris.

  Gosh, movies remember those?!  I have barely thought of anything but politics for so long now, it is over the top cool to see cardboard Dolly.

  Had to go way north from mid North Carolina to get back to Tennessee.  Through beautiful farm country.  Fall colors like pheasants and geese refresh the mind which has blue and red map of us all emblazoned on it.  Woke up to hear Trump's acceptance of our voting for him, mostly because where I fell asleep on the sofa, the TV is wall-size.  It was like Trump walked right into the home and said, "Okay!"

  Now we get to it, all of us more spirited for all that red all over the map.  These transitions in the past seem to bring a last phase of survival mode still more necessary as we gain traction...get more pro-business, and, apply all that compassion and caring that is part of patriotism.

  We've got some serious challenges!  But we've demonstrated--we're up for it.

But of course,

  My mom would be beaming proud and would def point out that her generation did it!  Got Reagan in too.  And I would agree that this election it was so important to join forces and put the good America first.  And it's important to live our values.  And hugely important to be an example for young people.

  To set the course and achieve the goals of re-Americanizing ourselves and honing that legacy that makes us different than most places on earth.

Pee and go

   Once I81 dumps you out of TN there's no mappage showing how to get to NC.  And if you're coming from fast food job, you get reprimanded for going into the women's bathroom not looking something enough, I guess.

  Everything is nice and quiet.  But the field of broke down tractors and lawnmowers kind of tells where we're at.  A gas station couple is quietly closing down a Sunday workday.  Kindly give directions.  More bananas from a grocery and the reassurance that there are still mountains to go before the flatland.  It's a thirty year de ja vous with the good people of America just doing the same USA we've been doing since I was a kid.

   It's like when "everybody" started wearing jeans.  We never really got back to "fashion" after that.  Big divides.

  The campaigning brings ideological politics front and center but for the majority of people most things are just routine.  Most people can't ride a ticket to get out of poverty.  A lot of people don't get to wear a suit and tie.  In everyday situation we don't yell RIGHTS, I WANT MY RIGHTS.  Or, Garbage, y'all are garbage and I'm gonna....

  We have a couple people as presidential candidates and we see them everywhere.  And the idea is to pick a side and go in that direction.  There's no "magic pill" that is going to turn the world into all one thing at this point.  Not even war.

  We do have big divide(s) and a lot of it is really about how we approach the same issues.  Finances do dictate most decision-making.  And each political party does offer particular forms of support for ideas and activities.  Some of it is moral support -- you can do it!  And here's why....

  The more self-reliant, street and trickle down, are actually greatly influenced by overall political tone because of that tone's coloring of environment, but environment--not in disaster mode--isn't a dictator in America.

  The current stagnation seems more like a paltry footbridge over chaos and non-participation or apathy about being a citizen.  But not about being American since we, in many ways, let that be even more lax than just wear jeans.  It became an illusory anything goes.  Of course, that sort of lack of commitment, absence of discipline, waffling about ideologically has put a strain on leftover system (much of which stemmed from programs and have long been past their "shelf dates"), and with an optimistic naw we didn't give up, really, at least not totally, we put the rug of politics over the gigantic imperfection of big divide.

  It's kind of important to have some kind of structure to nation.  The rug is not gonna do it.

  Headlines this past week give us rockets, intercontinental ballistic missiles, and drones stalking and killing people in the streets.  And American elections.

  The question that everyone is asking of leader and people really seems to be

  Is America mightily different?

I choose to care anyway

  It's not about gender for me.  I care about men and women and children doing America as America.

  I think to be too specific-cause defeats the purpose of our nation.

  My vote (if I can get to NC) goes to Trump because the stuff that we are up against needs someone that committed, that stubborn, and that willing and able to fight against the gigantic drone of ah, just leave it like it is.  It's been a wretched four years.

Sometimes I wonder

   what Martha Stewart's cats r thinking too.

  When I wonder about serious stuff, I also ask.

  It's a wonder that we have ICBMs and drones stalking people and news is still giving out location information.  Everyone had to stop doing that in like, the Vietnam War.  But back in the early 1990's I was able to put a similar question to some experts.  Interestingly, the censors and military and vague popular were hung up on numbers!  Yeah, because elections require the use of numerical data, we had to put a hold on a critical block on some other information.  Seriously.

  Of course we were freaking out; we were young people.  Especially as creatives we were afraid censorship would be forever.  And there were official lists of words we couldn't use.  It was a challenge to express ourselves with buzzers clamping down on all our ideas.  We had academic arguments with the living censor people.  And, heart-to-hearts with older than us professionals and loved ones.  Advertising had to be part of the phasing in of temporary restraints in communications.  That made for some "funny" ads.

  We talked through jarring issues like having full faith and confidence in our Armed Forces.  And, even, what ifs and how to carry on without the usual conveniences.  It's always intense when we have to ready for maybe swift action.  But we do so as a nation.  And not just one nation, but a nation with allies.  

  And it's always comforting to know that grown ups are always doing their work, so even while we got to do some less serious stuff, the grown ups had been on it.

  No stress.

Scary

   What I feel is close to hatred for disorder and chaos and other issues it would be easy to blame on one party or another, one gender or another.  Think I'll vote for eating lots of candy today.

  They made fun of people for recycling too!  Sometimes guys make no sense.  They made fun of a woman reporter covering a typhoon or tsunami in Japan and it became a harmless guy rally cry, "The recycling!" They'd say in a girly voice.  Totally missed the point-- that even in a disaster SOME PEOPLE CARE, especially about maintaining progress on making life's problems better.  They're so duh sometimes.

  Heck yeah I voted for Nikki Haley in the primary!  Duh wears me out. 

  It's okay, we're going to get Taiwan and U.S. chips going forward.  Better chips.

Getting dark now, watch out for trick or treaters!

Mas mejor chips.  I might even invest in that if the Spanish-speaking people where I'm doing laundry don't put me in their garbage can.  Thanks

  Ah, just candy wrappers and food truck taco empty plates in the garbage can!  I love Knoxville.

  Happy Halloween

 

   In a down home sitting area of the Hartford, Tennessee Welcome Area I had the chance to sit and tarry-a-bit in a rocking chair beneath the regal-looking and very muscled World Grand Champion Tennessee Walking Horse ~ Justified Honors.  The horse's name sort of goes with the legacy of the state of Tennessee.  It certainly seems to as I'm absorbed into some history displaying the noble role Tennessee braved in the Civil War.

  The display or installation has a profound portrait of men on battlefield.  The work of art shows The Battle of Fort Sanders (courtesy of the East Tennessee Historical Society) and in the reproduction of a painting Old Glory looms large over the fort under attack.

  The display tells of Tennessee as a strategic location crucial to both the Union and the Confederates due to the state's "location, river routes and rail paths, industries and farmlands".  The Tennessee Civil War National Heritage Area together with the Department of Tourist Development and the Department of Transpirtation has a partnership program called the Tennessee Civil War Trails.  This is part of a five-state trails system that helps people explore the "places associated with America's greatest challenge from 1861-1865".

  There are over 1000 sites "that tell the epic and heartfelt stories of civilians and soldiers, both black amd white, who experienced triumph and tragedy".  There are several sites in the Hartford, TN region.  And the Welcome Center (one of 19 in Tennessee) tells us about the Longstreet Campaign of 1863.  Confederate General Robert E. Lee sent his corps commander General James Longstreet to try and capture Knoxville ~ "a vital railroad junction that had fallen in early September to a Union force under the command of General Ambrose Burnside.

  "Fighting between the armies continued throughout the winter of 1863-1864 until Longstreet returned to Virginia, leaving the North in control of the Knoxville area for the remainder of the war."

  Almost 1500 engagements took place across Tennessee and, "The war years brought misery to almost every Tennessean," the display tells us.  "Yet, out of the ashes of war, Tenneseans, black and white, built a new society where slavery was abolished and citizenship redefined."

  The numbers are staggering:

  66,000 Confederates and 58,000 Federal soldiers were killed or wounded on Tennessee battlefields.

  "The division that made Tennessee a reflection of the rift between North and South also made it a testing ground of political reform after the war.  The state's many Unionists took power during Reconstruction and proceeded to abolish slavery, ratify the Reconstruction amendments to the Constitution and return Tennessee to the Union earlier than any other ex-Confederate state."

  "The sacrifices of African-American troops for the Union side strengthened the former slave's claim to a full share in postwar society.  These first steps toward emancipation and citizenship were the most hopeful legacy of the Civil War in Tennessee.  At war's end, 275,000 Tennesseans formerly enslaved were free."

  The information about the history of the U.S. including actual, physical war on homesoil amongst neighbors and families and citizens stands in stark contrast to contemporary Tennessee.  Like the glowing electric fire in the hearth here and the beautifully cared-for Welcome Center, today's Tennessee focuses more on ways people can experience the heartiness of an enduring spirit.

  From its Native American places to its other historical and peopled places; it's many trails through a diversity of commerce and craft, to its interconnectedness with real nature, Tennessee's portrait is so much more complex than even its complicated war time iterations.  

  Dozens of brochures invite to attractions ~ each its own mountain of interesting, and, proof that this state has weathered social transition and challenge to thrive locally-made and industrial-sized.  While the brochures boast of mainstays of fun and adventure each place of Tennessee, America also has its heroes and villians, humor and sorrows.

  The timberhewn Welcome Center with its wood furniture, handpainted scenery art and well-cared for vending and bathroom facilities presents that side of tourism that's about care and hospitality.  It's apt that here the wooden state-shaped "Tennessee" sign above an information desk is trimmed in gold.  Authentically valuable, Tennessee, as part of an America that is still rooted in tradition AND adaptable to such a diversity of people and purpose.  The mountains in this part of the state make for a pleasant preservation of space between states and population centers but the distances are fjorded by people well-versed in both formal and casual socializing.

  On this visit I talk with two men doing security and maintenance of the Welcome Center.  They confirm, as I've seen firsthand, that there is a lot of damage caused by Hurricane Helene.  It's posing real challenges to transportation between North Carolina and Tennessee.  Mr. Mike Washam relays news of at least four spots along I-40 that truly make the interstate impassable.  A four-lane area reduced to one lane of barely stable asphalt due to flooding, for example, is in need of repair.  The amounts of disaster relief money are up in the millions though, so there is a hopeful patience.  "And," Jesse McGaha points out, "Dolly Parton donated two million" for the fix up!  That puts monies for TN in the 32 million dollar ballpark, and NC is looking to use $100 million on disaster relief.

  The Hartford Welcome Center may see some changes in the future too, though not storm-related, there are electrical system updates and accessibility issues to be addressed.  But Jesse is proud to show me a unique feature of the Welcome Center...."It's the only one with a porch!" The rocking chairs are tucked inside so the porch can be pressure-washed.

  It's almost the start of November and up near the Martha Sundquist State Forest many of the leaves over the road are dropping hard now.  The forest road through there is temporarily closed so the TN Dept of Agriculture can repair wood bridges.  But on a clear night the starry sky and the sound of the stream there make for a perfect moment out of this year's political excitement.

  In some ways the weather and persisting clean up and repair have people doubling down on tending the homefires no matter what happens in national politics.  Word from the Welcome Center is that the major repairs will take into late next year (2025).

  The Soundtrack of America ~ Made In Tennessee movement or campaign or rally-around has made great effort to supercharge the Welcome Center with tourism and vacation ideas covering all of Tennessee.  With the Smokies and other area mountain spots involved so deeply in recovering from Hurricane Helene while getting ready for winter, it may be a good bet to plan immediate get-away time elsewhere in T'see.  All through the mountains and valleys of this region work is being done to save this land we love.  The overall tone is letting summer go, seasonal change, and we'll be here.

  Hot coffee and sausage on a biscuit at the locally owned Downtown Hartford Amoco.  The sun lights up the tops of nearby mountains revealing a patchwork of reds and browns and pine greens.  The gas station has handpainted team mascots in the windows.  Go Cosby Eagles!  Go Grassy Ravens!  And the assurance they've got The BEST pizza in town!

  On down the river road there is still a lot of debris from the storm and, sadly, peoples' soaked and ruined housewares.  The sounds of work trucks set a steady pace to morning.

  Behind the Ober Zipline and near the Moonshine Distillery the river is a tangled knot of tree and building parts.  River makes an oxbow there, a sort of "U"shape that gets waterlogged.  It's home to some rafting outfits which over the summer were quite bustling.  Some of the local eateries are badly damaged.  All along the river trees and people goods are cramming the banks.  Under a low bridge whole trees are jammed in and piled a dozen or so feet tall.  Then for several miles the landscape and peoples' homes bear the scars of raging river.  Fields of corn are battered and run over by the now-receded, mostly--but for the ponding and boggish sunken spots--flooding.  Home after home has water-debris-smashed wreckage.  In some spots vehicles were carried and smushed into poles and other structure.

  At points on the river road there is rock ledge that must've forced the flooding away from it and widened the path of destruction.  Vegetation is still hanging, dragged by the current, in some spots, fifteen feet above the riverbed.

  Over to Cosby I went hoping to get in one more night of camping before saying goodbye to summer.  To no avail.  Like most else anywhere near the Smokies, the storm eclipsed a lingering with nature as the seasons change this year.  Crickets, slow and not too loud in a not-too-hot sunshine was the parting kiss.

  All over the byways that aren't I40 the people traffic is a mix of regular day and repair.  Close-to but not directly impacted by storm is also a buzz of seasonal change and people like myself cut out of getting to North Carolina.  Trucks--asked not to travel those routes--barreling and turning around, turning around.  

  To my knowledge I81 is really the only legitimate way to go.  For me, it's compounding stress and hardship about voting this year.  The quiet but solid message from the mountains is can't go this way.  We're flummuxed.  Even miles and miles of pushing onward brings sudden Road Closed into the twists and turns of travel.  Whether it's storm-related or private property matters there is a maddening barricade between our states right now.  Probably closing normally welcoming places of the forest will alleviate the snarl.

  The shops and artisan places in Gatlinburg are welcoming leaf peepers and mountain haunt seekers!  And all through the area between Gatlinburg and Sevierville autumn hangs on regular like holiday decs.  So does a calm and steady show of support for Trump.  The signage, some handmade and vibrant red, white, and blue has definitely increased since earlier this year.  But there is an understated campaign feel.  Goes with storm-driven, let's get back to the business of being us.

  For sure the changes per Helene are forcing the hand on camping and tourism, but as people compelled to visit we're going with the flow as much as possible.

  Back in the city, Knoxville.  Our part of town is also feeling decided.  There's a welcomed relaxation of a hard-driving campaign season.  I feel proud of all of us for not being as ugly as we have been in some years.  Seems like way more determination in a mighty tide-turning...if not for assured outcome, at least in speaking out against sinking in a mysterious and lurking "socialism".  We're holding down the fort ~ the Stars and Stripes front and center.

So say

  Say a person has an accident and messes up their spine.  The way to have best chance recovery/life going forward is to re-align the spine to its original functioning position.  Politics in a Republic is not the spine.  The Republic is the spine.

  This matters even more at times when the whole world is configuring as economic markets/entities and institution (for lack of a better word).

  As if the planet is shifting its center of gravity or on its axis, the will of the people and the powers of organization sometimes require us to prioritize what's most important, right now.  In a rumbly world it is most important right now to define nation as nation.  That's a baseline.  The particular politics within the different kinds of nations are the most contentious rumbly.

  A lot of Americans are afraid that we will lose our political rights in voting for the Republican party to manage our Republic, but in terms of world politics, it is most critical right now to BE a Republic.  The world stage is forming into a more staunch version of different kinds of nation, each with economic and social structures of their own.  We have to be strong as America on that stage!

  Oh yeah.  There is some difference for us on some stuff between political rights and Constitutional rights!  That's especially important as we realign our social boundaries to stuff like property law.  Our law-scape is layers of local, State, and National.  And just existing in physical space/place makes us subject to all the laws/rules of that place!  That's why sometimes we each choose to keep our opinions and expressions to ourselves.  "Talk" is not a legal move.

  Reading?  Today I am re-reading Rand Paul's The Case Against Socialism.

  

  An example of important independent within syndicate reporting, the kind Jason Stanley talks about as redemptive, is in Senator Paul's [not sure if he's still a senator at this time, but was] book....so economic collapse happened in Venezuela and an immediate issue for everyone was food scarcity!  The newspaper USA Today ran a report of a reporter talking with an out-of-work construction worker who was standing in line with 300 other people at a grocery store.  Not only was it testament to not a normal day, but it was also letting other places know what was happening there.  When our social boundaries contract, it's even more important for us to keep in touch about our home turfs.

  In our country I was once in a grocery store line of people (2008 or 9 I think) of +1100 people wanting to work in that grocery store.  It had closed because of black mold in the building but then after a couple years was able to re-lease that property.

  I've noticed around Knoxville many stores are getting in good shape for people to buy what we need on budgets that have really reduced doing a lot of shopping.

  Even our local thrift shops are looking cool for reward and holiday gifts.

  Overall, it's going to be a hard climb back to prosperity.

  Our "popular" agrees about some stuff.  But in addition to guarding the Republic, self-care, and working on everything we have to be careful not to get knocked off balance by too far left, or, too far right.  That was the reason people came up with the word "extreme" and why us North Carolina and Tennessee people really got into a hot pepper contest.  And why we call some sports extreme and others not so much.  Some activities are sports category, but some activities are too "ultra" or "extreme" to fit neatly into the "sports" category.  At least that's what we were talking about thirty, forty years ago.

  

Ah yeah, it matters

  It matters that members of both parties welcome Trump back to the mothership of total party, so it matters to admonish the "dark humor".  His and Trump's potty-mouths only fly as campaign stunts frankly.  Oooooo tough guy talk.  Having to call the land we all love a dumping ground because it's too dangerous to say much about other countries' spies being here, other countries' operatives being here to rattle the cage we are in as a nation at the moment.

  It also matters to keep businesses open and the whole country functioning so no mysterious "they" prevents us hand-to-mouthers from being able to survive another week and afford voting!

Hybrid terms

   A term like "Christo-facism" is like a description of a compound.  To me, I intellectually understand why we come up with ways to describe even not fully formed happenings, like warnings.  But Christianity is actually opposite of facism.

  I'll write more after work.  It's terrifying to hear people telling us that Christianity and wealth/prosperity/success is Nazi-ism.  Makes a cloudy day spooky.

  Day was not spooky here.  Bunch of professionals getting work done.

  So, we heard the hybrid term "Christo-fascism" on the program "On the Media".  And I am so grateful to author of Erasing History Jason Stanley for writing up some description and warning about what can happen when very complicated political theory (largely revolving around "hate") is being brought to life by popular movements.

  He points out the many comparisons between factors in the world today and stuff that happened back in history.  In the United States we have not fully erased our history of freedom and liberty for all citizens, but elsewhere in the world that is happening.  People erase or omit parts of history and often replace the vacancy with a one-sided version or what is called "propaganda".  He also made the point that being aware of history is a really positive way of not letting it be erased.

  There is fear that we can't go back in time and correct mistakes and horrors, or even truly compensate for history.  Some people have come to settlement--legally, financially, through learning and growing, and through commemoration and memorial.  And some have had to come to terms inwardly and privately.  Sometimes people can forgive.  Sometimes forgiveness is not possible.  Sometimes not forgetting though forgiving is what has been forged.  And even when people forgive and forget (move on) there is cause to put the event or actions/feelings into a state of remembrance about, so we're not forgetting pain caused, pain felt.

  Historical happenings are collective re-experience, so it's difficult to pin one perspective onto time periods and social/political experience.

  The "On the Media" program introduced us to a baseline wondering in thinking about fascism as "ideology", or,  "a way of doing politics".  There are examples in history of nations, groups, leaders whose "politics" did evolve from idea into mechanized or systematic.  The classic examples are Hitler and Stalin whose political ways dragged the world into phases of warring.  And whose dictatorships sculpted generations of people into "like-minded" and without choice (survival wise) about "supporting" what came across as the "popular" or majority-driven, overall way of their nations.

  Some countries adopted political structuring according to dictators' plans.  Other places became a mix of tendencies and trajectory.  Still other territories were designated in the orbits and spheres of dominate rule.  Some places have developed along world religion lines.  Some have developed with a decaying religious rule propped up by secular solution.  And many have declared to be democracies or not under authoritarian rule.  That doesn't mean there aren't rules and dominating trends.  And it doesn't mean there's clearcut paths to solutions.  A secular solution in the West has been rule of Law.  But almost everything about laws and even the legal systems has also come under scrutiny and had contentious debate surrounding it.

  Jason Stanley's book discussion on the program is sort of a messenger about some major turbulence in the world resurfacing in our own times.  He looks at how the United States has "often used fascist solutions to national problems" and so clarifies some of the friction that exists in calling ourselves both a democracy and a Republic.  A grave danger is that such a potentially "great" nation can be co-opted or used by forces and people who make the effort to strip America of it's unique properties (found in our Constitution) or who endeavor to get hold of our nation and use us to power their group's thing.

  Stanley also argues that degrading any human as not human, or worse, vermin, beasts, trash...villifying or monsterizing some lends itself to making some of the people targets and others the targeting.  When hate gets political, in other words, we all lose ways to transcend the outcome which is destruction and death.

  Historical research and analysis of philosophy and social movements, law, and civilization shows that people and places can change into something different from principle.  History gives us a lot of samples.  And current events display national differences.  Fundamental shifts in world politics and warring have brought us into having to have critical awareness of ourselves first and how we as a nation-- that is not a fascism-- can survive and thrive.

  One way I'm processing "the fascism debate" is thinking about the issue of "abortion".  The political "left" of center is saying it's proof of "fascism" for the political "right" of center to have made abortion (a medical procedure) a State rather than a Federal issue.  Un-federalizing the medical procedure is as much about how tax dollars get spent as it is a moral issue on the whole.  So while the left side is saying, that's them (the right side) taking away a woman's control of her own body...the right side is not out to control a woman's body so much as not being forced to pay for abortion as a national chore.  Also, it's a move to demechanize abortion as a federal tool.  Putting it back to State puts the medical procedure back to a more local level.  It deflates the federal power regarding the procedure which is more in line with a goverment not being authoritarian.