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Best laid plans…

Do you ever over-organize your life?

I’m a planner. A list maker extraordinaire. The trouble is, I tend to think I can do more in a day than I actually can accomplish. Every. Single. Day.

Several inexpensive and two free online writing courses came along at the same time, and I took the bait.

As if that weren’t enough… along came Hurricane Helene.

I had a full schedule of webinars to participate in and other writing-related things I wanted/needed to do.

The rain poured on Thursday, and that was from a whole different weather system. They said it had nothing to do with Helene… that Helene’s winds and rain bands would arrive overnight and last most of the day Friday.

I got up early Friday morning to listen to the news and weather reports. It was still raining, but I thought we were probably going to be all right. Just as I started to put a pot of water on the cooktop to boil for a nice oatmeal and blueberry breakfast… the power went off.

I forget how addicted I am to writing at the computer… until the power goes off.

I’m trying to take the high road and not whine about the power being off for 14 hours. I live out in the country and have a well so when the electricity is off I don’t have any water. Things get interesting fairly quickly. However, this was a minor inconvenience compared to the widespread flooding and devastation that has and continues to occur in western North Carolina.

I live about 500 miles from where Hurricane Helene made landfall on the Gulf coast of Florida. It was hard to grasp that Helene would still be packing such a punch when she got to North Carolina, even though meteorologists warned that this could be a rain event of historic proportions in the mountains of the state.

Hurricane Helene and her remnants caused devastation in biblical proportions over hundreds and hundreds of miles. What I experienced here in the piedmont doesn’t hold a candle to what happened in the Appalachian Mountains 100 miles to the west.

Asheville, North Carolina is getting the bulk of the media coverage, so you might not be aware that the entirety of western North Carolina is in a world of hurt right now. Some areas received over 25 inches of rain from Helene.

Chunks of I-40 were washed away by flood waters while other sections are under mudslides. Virtually every highway and country road in the mountains were or still are impassable. (That total was 400 on Friday and Saturday, but dropped to 280 yesterday.) Town after town after town in addition to Asheville experienced record-breaking flooding. Not to mention all the nooks and crannies that aren’t towns but tiny communities. Many areas have not been accessed yet as I write this.

Roads are gone. Communications are down or spotty at best. The situation is dire and becomes more dangerous by the day.

Two weeks ago I blogged about my visit to my alma mater, Appalachian State University, in Boone, North Carolina (Who says you can’t go home again? Revisiting a university campus). Seeing aerial pictures of the Town of Boone under water has been gut wrenching the past days. The 21,000 students must be shell-shocked! I would have been if this had happened while I was a student there.

If you have subscribed to my monthly e-newsletter, earlier in September you read about my “field trip” to Swannanoa, North Carolina. I gave some of the history of the construction of the Western North Carolina Railroad through Swannanoa Gap in the 1870s. Sadly, the sketchy reports coming out of the Swannanoa/Black Mountain/Montreat/Old Fort area a few miles east of Asheville indicate that those particular towns are suffering severely from the flooding and landslides caused by Hurricane Helene.

The quaint small town of Chimney Rock was practically wiped off the map. Isolated communities and small towns are scattered throughout western North Carolina. The death toll is rising as search and rescue operations continue. Even the interstate highways are steep and winding.

Almost every one of the mountain towns I can think of was flooded on Friday. Cell, landline service, and electricity were knocked out. I’ve seen pictures of almost every town I can think of being under water.

Although served by two interstate and several US highways, on Friday and Saturday the city of Asheville (population 95,000) was only accessible by air.

I’m afraid the news cycle will transition to the fighting in the Middle East and back to the coming US elections. The public will soon forget Hurricane Helene. Or, there will be another natural disaster that needs our attention.

The devastation from Hurricane Helene covers hundreds of square miles in western North Carolina.

As the area slowly recovers over the coming months and years — when you know you won’t be in the way of first responders and second and third responders — visit the area and patronize the small businesses. Eat at the diners instead of the chain restaurants. Shop at the little shops and independent bookstores instead of at the big-box stores.

Western North Carolina’s economy depends on tourism. Autumn is the biggest tourist season as the native hardwood forests put on a colorful show. Tourists will not be visiting the area this fall because so many of the roads are in shambles.

Western North Carolina is famous for its apples. This is the beginning of apple season. Many orchards were severely damaged last week, but if you have the opportunity to purchase apples from North Carolina this fall or any time in the future, do so to help the farmers get back on their feet.

Western North Carolina is also famous for its Christmas trees. Many of the fir and spruce trees that have graced the White House through the years were grown in North Carolina. If you can buy a tree from North Carolina in December, do so.

Western North Carolina is known for its artisans. Quilt makers, glass blowers, textile artists, weavers, woodcrafts people, painters, musicians, potters, makers of corn husk dolls, knitters, and crocheters depend on tourists to purchase their wares. But now many of their retail outlets are gone. Seek them out online on marketplaces such as Etsy.com.

Mountaineers are sturdy, intelligent, talented, resilient, resourceful people. They roll with the punches during winter blizzards and hard times, and many of them are about as self-sufficient as a person can be in the 21st century. But when they experience a 1,000-year flood followed by the remnants of a hurricane all in the span of three days that affects every community in the region, they need a hand up. They don’t want our pity. They need our support.

If you are so moved and are able, do what you can to help the hurting people of southern Appalachia. Donate what you can to a reputable charitable organization of your choice.

Since my last blog post

I got to visit a veteran of World War II and the Korean War last week who celebrated his 100th birthday this weekend. How many people get to do that?

Until my next blog post

I’m writing this on September 29 and scheduling it for September 30. A fiber optics cable is being moved a couple of miles up the road and my internet service is going to be interrupted any minute now for an undetermined length of time. Not that Windstream gave us any warning. If not for word-of-mouth, we would have been blindsided. On second thought, I think I’ll just go ahead and hit the “publish” button and not rely on the “schedule” button! So much for my best laid plans for tomorrow!

Until my next blog post

I hope you have a good book to read.

Don’t take your family or friends for granted.

Remember the people of Ukraine and the people of western North Carolina.

Janet

22 thoughts on “Best laid plans…”

  2. Thanks for the NC news. So sorry to hear of the devastation, loss of life and property. Great idea to promote NC artisans on Etsy. I’m with you on the overly long to do lists! Of course (I can’t) I can do that in one day!

    Liked by 1 person

  3. Thank you, Rebecca. The drone videos and still photos coming out of there are unbelievable. My to-do lists are completely out-of-control! Apparently, the workers moving the fiber optics line have quit for the night, but my Monday list might be wrecked. Of course, if that’s the case, there are hundreds of tree limbs that need to be picked up! (Not what I want to do, though!)

    Liked by 1 person

  6. It’s all been very secretive and confusing. A man up the road found out it was to happen and last night it was put on a neighborhood group on cell phone last night that service would be interrupted any minute and “possibly” restored today. That didn’t happen. “The word on the street” a couple of hours ago was that the work had been started but at last check there were no workers there. Something is being done to the line to accommodate a housing subdivision that’s under construction — or so “the word on the street” is. The local phone company and internet service provider (and I use the term loosely) is Windstream. We’re out in the country and in a no-man’s land when it comes to internet service. (We don’t even have cable TV for about a mile radius!) Anyway… maybe we’ll have internet service tomorrow, and maybe we won’t. It is more than mildly irritating that Windstream has told us nothing, but it’s not surprising. The rain from Helene stopped here late Friday afternoon, but there’s a chance of showers tomorrow. The last report I saw from Asheville on CNN earlier tonight said it was raining there again — the last thing those poor people need! After tomorrow, it’s supposed to be dry the rest of the week, thank goodness! Thank you for your concern, Rebecca, but I am truly just fine — just preoccupied with the tragedy to our west in such a beautiful area.

    Liked by 1 person

  7. Well, glad Winstream is not in our area, from your experiences with it! But the provider we have has common outages… Glad you are well and that after tomorrow the rain will hold off for a bit. Asheville sounds like such a great town. Hope to visit it one day.

    Liked by 1 person

  9. I’m glad you were out of the worst of it. The coverage has been pretty devastating – hard to imagine that the area will recover quickly, but people are amazingly resilient in these situations. As you say, the news will soon move on to other stories, so I hope you might be able to give us an update from time to time.

    Liked by 1 person

  12. Yes, Liz, it needs to be. All my life, floods in NC have been compared to The Flood of 1916. This one far-exceeded the damage done by the one in 1916. Talk about irony… the NC DOT steel historical highway marker about the Flood of 1916 in Asheville was destroyed in the Flood of 2024. The face of our mountains has been changed forever. There are cases where river and creeks have rerouted. One reporter told of a case where the river used to be on one side of a highway. The highway was washed out and now the river has cut a new channel on the other side of where the highway used to be. The logistics of redesigning and rerouting highways and bridges will be monumental. Just having been in the mountains in August and again September 12-13 and seeing the photos now is sickening. The last week in August my sister and I visited our favorite waterfall, Looking Glass Falls” on US-276. Reports are that miles of US-276 are now gone. I cannot wrap my head around it.

    Liked by 1 person

  13. David, the Samurai approach to life is so much a part of you, I cannot imagine that you ever procrastinate like I do. It seems the older I get, though, the more “life happens” and my plans for the day or the week just go out the window. I continue to plan more than I can physically or mentally accomplish even under the best of circumstances. Here it is, 4:00 Tuesday afternoon and I’ve only checked off three things I planned to do yesterday and today. I’m always playing catch up! Thank you for reading my blog. I hope you are doing well, all things considered.

    Liked by 1 person

  15. Janet, it’s good to hear from you about procrastination and “catching up.” To me, my procrastination is not procrastination in the normal sense. My procrastination is a process of building up energy that I at a later time turn to action. In my house I am responsible for getting the dishes washed. My wife might tell me it would be a good idea to wash the dishes. But I’m not ready yet, I will be ready tomorrow afternoon. I haven’t procrastinated. I am just not ready yet. It could be that it takes you a week or months to be ready to write or get organized. You are nor procrastinating. You just need more time to be ready to start.

    Liked by 1 person

  17. Various government agencies, charitable organizations, and individuals are doing all they can. National Guard from many states including Minnesota (Thank you, Gov. Tim Walz!), 1,000 active-duty soldiers from Fort Liberty (formerly, Fort Bragg), the “Cajun Navy” from Louisiana, World Central Kitchen, 400 nurses have flown in from as far away as Alaska, linemen from as far away as Canada…. The outpouring of assistance from across the US and Canada has renewed my faith in people. But the scope of destruction is overwhelming. The facility that makes 60% of the IV fluids used in the US was flooded and is closed indefinitely. The pure quartz mines in Spruce Pine that produce the purest quartz in the world (used for so many electronics components and heat shields for space capsules, etc.) were flooded. The list goes on and on… manufacturing facilities that the country and world depend on that we didn’t even know were in NC are now shut down and almost inaccessible from the outside world because so many highways and state roads are washed away. Water and sewer systems…. People lost their homes, their businesses, their jobs, their schools. More than 1 million homes and businesses in western NC and SC are still without electricity. I’ve heard several anchors in the national news media trying to pressure people on the ground to blame the government for this. The man running for US President claims there has been no response from the federal government. Just another one of his million lies! No one could have predicted this. It is no one’s fault, and all levels of the government have been on this since the moment it started unfolding. All people thought to be in danger of flooding were told to evacuate in advance. This exceeded a 1,000-year flood. The affected area just in western NC covers 600 square miles. How dare the man running for President or the news media try to make this political or place blame! How dare they! Natural disasters happen, and this one is too big to get my head around. I’m writing an update to include in my blog on Monday. Thank you, Liz, for your continuing concern and caring about the affected area. We’re afraid it will quickly drop off the national news radar.

    Liked by 1 person

  18. Thank you for your thoughtful response, Janet. Biden has responded promptly and well to the various disasters that have occurred during his time in office. Moving forward into the future, I can see FEMA’s role and funding expanding. These adverse weather events aren’t going to go away, and we never know where or how hard they’re going to hit next.

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  19. This was a great blog. We take so much for granted and to hear you first describe the devastation and then the ideas of how to help support was fantastic. It was a reminder that small actions help.

    As for procrastination – we are all guilty but events like the above prove we need to do things before the proportions are overwhelming.

    Liked by 1 person

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