Floating in the Middle

Yesterday, I was at the gym with my good friend Liz when a report about the congressional hearings for a possible Big 3 (automakers) bailout came on the television. It was one of those annoying shows where some "expert" rambles on for a little while and then takes phone calls from all the Joe-the-Plumbers out there. For the most part, neither of us was paying attention, and it seemed no one else in the gym was listening either.

But then, out of the blue, the talking head said something that ripped us all out of "The Zone" (okay, I wasn't in The Zone, but I'm sure someone was): "And now we go to Mark in West Virginia."

Mark? In West Virginia? WEST VIRGINIA?

"Oh, God!" I heard Liz gasp at the precise moment I muttered, "Oh, no!"

We know the reality: When "Mark in West Virginia" hits the airwaves its going to be a free-for-all with the hillbilly jokes. We braced ourselves as we awaited Mark's voice. When Mark turned out to be a well-spoken gentleman with only a hint of an Appalachian accent, we relaxed. You could actually hear the sigh of relief from all of us at the fitness center. We immediately began analyzing Mark and why he was a good representative of the people of West Virginia: He didn't sound like a hick, you didn't need an interpreter to understand him, his comments were reasonably intelligent...

On the way home that night I began to wonder why we, as West Virginians, react that way. I'm sure that when people from New York hear, "And now we go to Mark in New York", they don't freeze in panic the way we West Virginians do. For that matter, I don't think there are many people in this country that have to brace themselves the way we Mountaineers do. Then again, others haven't had to cope with the steady stream of prime-time insults that we have had to deal with: The poor, uneducated, shoeless hill folk that regularly appeared on "Night Court" were from West Virginia. On "Becker", Ted Danson once began the show with a rambling monologue about his morning being ruined by "some toothless hillbilly in West Virginia" who allowed his kid to have a gun. When Monica (on "Friends") was mislead into believing a romantic couple were brother and sister, she reacted to their display of intimacy with, "What is this? Cocktails in Appalachia?" The West Virginia jokes are endless... so we brace ourselves when we hear any mention of West Virginia on the television.

More than that, West Virginians are well aware that they don't really fit in anywhere. Thanks to a scuffle known as the Civil War, the South won't have us. Apparently, secession from Virginia in order to abandon the Confederacy and hook up with the Union was considered to be a treacherous act. And yet, leaving the Confederacy and joining the Union wasn't enough for the North to ever accept us. We've always been caught somewhere in the middle, this enigma floating mostly South of the Mason-Dixon, with one little finger desperately clinging to the North.

Maybe that's why we seem to seek each other out. In Denver, all I had to do to find other transplanted West Virginians was to don my WVU ball cap and head down to Woody's Pizza and Bar to watch a game on the big screen. The second I shouted at the television, someone would come to me and tell me that they, too, were West Virginian. Once, I wore my gold rush (WVU) t-shirt and walked across the University of Denver's campus during some sort of event. Half a dozen people happily cheered, "Go 'Eers" as I passed them.

We cling to each other because that's all that we have. We can move beyond the borders, but the second others find out where we are from, preconceived notions arise. We don't actually seek each other out, but we find each other nonetheless... maybe its God's way of making sure that even in a world where no one is like us, we aren't alone.

Still, though, I look forward to the day when the rest of America can see us for who we are and not as stereotypes. I look forward to the day when we don't have to wince when we hear the dreaded words, "And now, Mark in West Virginia." I look forward to the day when we can openly talk about the problems that plague us: poverty, lack of educational opportunities, lack of adequate health care, poor nutrition... and not have our portion of the discourse shadowed by the image of the eternal hillbilly. I have to believe that day is coming. I have to believe because I couldn't be here, doing what I do, walking amongst the poorest of the poor in the Valley of King Coal's Dry Bones if I didn't' believe that one day Appalachia will be a part of America, too.

Why Obama Doesn't Inspire Hope In Me

On November 5, 2008 I awoke to an America that so many people had believed had somehow changed. Yet, as I ventured out into the morning sun, my America was still the same as it had always been. I was pleased with the outcome of the vote and satisfied that the best choice we had had indeed been chosen. Yet, my morning after was devoid of excitement or a sense of hope.

Everywhere I turned there seemed to be an air of excitement in mainstream America. Television stations were playing and replaying President-Elect Barak Obama’s victory speech. The Internet was lit up with election analysis. The font page of the papers proudly proclaimed “Change” in large letters. Facebook status updates were all about people’s excitement (or disappointment, depending on whom they voted for)… and yet, the people I encountered that day didn’t have much to say.

The secretary at my church, a devout Republican and news junkie, didn’t say a word when I came into the office. The trustee chair, a devout Democrat and staunch opponent of the Bush-era, didn’t say a word. No one was talking about the election down at the famous Sterling (an authentic relic of the drive-in restaurant era), nor were they talking about it at the Post Office (a popular hangout and gathering spot). I walked across town to visit a missionary run thrift shop I support, and there was not talk about Obama there either. It seemed so odd to me that the rest of America couldn’t seem to shut up about it, but no one in Welch, WV seemed to notice that America had just elected it’s first black president, let alone the dream of “change.” In fact, people seemed more interested in the upcoming Veteran’s Day celebration than the results of the election the night before.

My own election apathy had weighed heavily on me since my return to West Virginia earlier in the summer, but despite my desperate attempt to care about either one of the candidates I couldn’t help but feel skeptical. Obama had not spent any real time in West Virginia, having written us off early in the campaign. McCain played on the religious sympathies and conservative ideals… but I just didn’t see how he would be a solution to the problems we were facing. Then again, there was nothing about Obama that seemed promising to Appalachia. Once again, Appalachia was a forgotten region and the rest of America didn’t even notice us.

Yet, I had assumed that the lack of excitement I woke up with was purely a result of my own apathy and not reflective of a larger cultural issue… and then I went into town and realized that in the most politicized city in McDowell County, no one was talking about the election.

I called it an early day and decided to unwind with a long drive through “The County” (what we call McDowell County in these parts… you’d have to live here to fully understand it).

I pointed my car toward Gary and just started driving… and slowly the source fo the lack of excitement became obvious to me.
As I passed through Gary I saw several houses with hand painted signs reading, “President Obama”, “Obama 4 President”, and “Obama 2008”. These signs were driven into the ground before run-down trailers and nailed to the roofs of houses that looked unsafe to live in.

Obama’s message of hope had been heard loud and clear in those homes, but I wondered if Obama would ever hear them.

I kept going, troubled by the fact that some of America’s poorest citizens were being fed American myths of hope and optimism. We had lived through those stories before. JFK came to McDowell County to prove a Catholic could win a Protestant state. When he made his way to Welch, he was horrified by the extreme rates of poverty he was seeing. Jackie Kennedy, who had lived a sheltered life of over-abundance and luxury, had her own Buddha moment as she witnessed the ugliness of hunger for the first time in her life. They preached about change and about hope. West Virginia bought it hook line and sinker… and all these years later, we aren’t any better off than we were when JFK promised us the world.

My car wove through the narrow roads of McDowell County. Twice I had to stop on a two-lane road to allow a coal truck to pass when the lanes got too narrow for them to stay on their own side of the road. I thought about how the UMWA (United Mine Workers of America) had openly supported Obama… I wondered if these men were conflicted by their lack of options. Conservative fiscal policies had been destructive to Southern West Virginia, yet Obama’s coal agenda would force many of these men out of work. As a proponent of green energy, I was excited about the movement toward sustainable energy, but Obama had not once considered what these men would do for work when their jobs disappeared. No matter how those coal truck drivers voted, they were voting against their own well-being.

I turned my car down Jenkinjones holler. Jenkin Jones was one of the first coal barons who launched the first large scale mining operation in this area of Appalachia. Few people lived in McDowell County because if its harsh terrain, but when Jenkin Jones made a fortune off the black ore, other entrepreneurs flocked to the region. Soon the people who had lived on this land lost their homes and were living in unsanitary and unsafe conditions, working deep in the mines until they died (at which time their families would lose their company homes) or until they were broken down by the mines (at which point he and his family were forced out of their homes). The settlers were mostly Scots-Irish and Welsh, but now came the new wave of immigrants: Italians, Russians, Spaniards, Germans, and Southern African Americans venturing northward… and they, too, crawled back into the dark belly of the earth to drag out the dirty black rocks that made their employers so much money.

The town of Jenkinjones was once a thriving coal community, but the mines paid out and the Pocahontas Coal and Fuel Company pulled out, leaving hollow shells of buildings and mining equipment and structures to rust. The people left in Jenkinjones fell into poverty, as they had never experienced before. Today, Jenkinjones boasts a poverty rate of around 75%. Houses have been left abandoned and they are now in a state of decay. Houses that still host life are also in a state of decay; only it has been moderately slowed.

I continued my drive through the County, and was overwhelmed by the poverty and misfortune I saw. There were once beautiful houses that could not be sold because when the coal companies built they did build a septic or sewer system. The Tug Fork River served that purpose. Eventually codes were passed that would prohibit this, but the houses sat on lots too small for septic tanks and the infrastructure of Appalachia is severely lacking, so there is no sewer to tap into. The houses could not be sold because they could not be brought up to code… as the families moved on, the houses were left to fall apart.

The kudzu vines have overtaken the hillsides, swallowing up the trees and bushes and laurel native to these hills. Under the relentless hostile advance of the kudzu, the life is choked out of the plant life and the transplanted vine has wreaked havoc on the natural environment.

I drove past mountains that had been stripped and now were unable to sustain life. There were mountains being dismantled, rivers and streams being covered with mine waste, slurry ponds filled with black poisonous water, and houses sitting at the baseline of the strip mines, threatened daily by the disaster waiting to happen.

It hit me somewhere around Keystone as I drove past the coal preparation plant and watched the smoke pouring out of the stacks that there may not be any hope for Appalachia.

Once upon a time these people grew their own vegetable, raised their own hogs, and largely provided for themselves… but then people with money came and convinced them to sell the mineral rights to what was below their thin top-soil. Now, the people who once grew their own food must drive an hour out to the Wal-Mart to buy packaged and processed food that has been shipped in from God-knows-where. Now, the people of Appalachia are some of the most obese in the nation, suffering from diabetes, heart disease and numerous other weight-related problems.

The wealth of curative herbs and plants that once kept the people of Appalachia healthy has been crushed beneath the earth-moving machines. Now, the people who live in these hollows and hills are unable to afford health care, and even if they can get healthcare, are unable to make the long drive to the nearest hospital.

These are a people who have been beaten down by companies and governments alone. (The only time the US Government has sanctioned the Air Force to bomb US citizens occurred in West Virginia over a coalmine strike.) These are a people who have been fed American myths until they could burst, and burdened like pack mules to labor for an otherwise prosperous nation, and then left for dead once their usefulness had expired. These are a people who have been oppressed by the American machine, who have been beaten up by American greed, and who have been betrayed over and over again by the American myth of hope and optimism.

As I drove through The County, I knew that Obama’s hope was for fools with the luxury to dream… it was not for the cold, hard reality of Appalachia.

My people weren’t excited and buzzing about the election because there was nothing to be excited about and nothing to create a buzz. America woke up with the promise of change, but Appalachia woke up with the reality of an unchanged and greedy America that would continue to trample them.

Maybe Obama could dream of hope and maybe my friends in mainstream America could dream of hope… but that is because their America is not my America. I lived in their America for three years and was constantly reminded that I was different and out of place… I didn’t fit in, and I would only be accepted if I left everything about my Appalachian past behind me.

The only America I have ever really known is one that Great America doesn’t want to acknowledge:

The America I know is one of extreme poverty only rivaled by the two-thirds world.

The America I know is one in which hope is used as an opiate and a weapon so that money-seekers can rape the land the walk away.

The America I know is one that has been brutalized by a greedy nation.

The America I know is one that sends her children to bed in a cold house without a proper meal.

The America I know is one where the people who live on the land where the coal and the gas are extracted can’t afford heat or electricity.

The America I know is one where hope is only for fools…

We Have a Mine Shaft Gap!

So... last Sunday I was facilitating a bible study at First Welch and somehow we got onto the topic of water. Folks in McDowell County do not generally drink their tap water (or cook with it), but purchase water for those things instead. I had not really thought too much about it. After all, I grew up in the Kanawha Valley, where chemical plants line the river like Christmas lights on the National Lampoon house. You don't drink the water from the Kanwaha River (or eat the fish you catch) because only God knows what kind of chemical has been dumped into the river. So, purchasing water to drink is pretty standard in my neck of the woods.

Then there is the reality that a great many people in West Virginia do not have access to public water in their homes and rely on well water. Well water usually has a powerful sulfuric smell (and taste), so folks with well water often purchase drinking water from the store. Once again, no biggie.

So, when I moved to The County and discovered folks do not drink the water, I didn't think twice. I, however, did not feel safe heading down to the spring that comes out of the mountain beside Route 52 and gathering water. Nor did I desire to purchase drinking water just to be left with all those empty plastic bottles. Instead, I relied on my trusty Brita Water Pitcher to remove an chlorine taste that might linger, and I was happy.

However, it was revealed that Welch's drinking water comes from an abandoned mine shaft. These mine shafts are routinely flooded, and so we essentially are setting atop a huge underground lake.

"What?" I gasped, "The water comes from a mine shaft? And we're drinking THAT?"

Suddenly, the same people who had just been encouraging me to purchase drinking water and who insisted that "no one drinks Welch water" became very defensive.

"The water's cleaner here than it is in Charleston," one person said, offering a jab at me.

"It's clean," another stated matter-of-factly.

"But," I argued, "When water runs out of the mines and into the rivers, its acid run-off and it kills everything..."

"But you're getting it before it goes through the acid," a woman objected.

I blinked, stupidly. I had no idea where water in a coal mine ceased to be water and became acid run-off, so I had nothing I could say. I just sat there, listening to people who don't drink the water defend their water source. I wondered why they couldn't make the connection in their heads that a polluted water source is a polluted water source, regardless of what the coal companies tried to say. If it ain't safe to drink, it ain't acceptable!

"We're lucky," one gentleman said, "We're lucky we've got all these mine shafts filled with water. When it doesn't rain, other counties go into a drought, but we've got water."

What???

It seems people have all the pieces of the puzzle at their disposal, but they just don't have the vision to connect all the pieces to get the big picture. I suppose that's what my job is: to put the puzzle together.

One thing I can assure you, though: I'm not drinking the water.

The Jesus Door

In my last post I referenced the choir door at First UMC that has the image of Jesus in it. Apparently, there is a consensus at this church that by revealing the "miracle", every "crazy in the country" would come through. Now, the Bible I've been reading tells me that that's who Jesus spent a lot of his precious time with. But more importantly is the implication one congregant made when she said, "You have no idea the good that door has done this church. It's really let us know Jesus is right here with us." That's right. Jesus is right here with us, but we are going to keep him locked up in a building (my paraphrase). I don't think that's right. So, without much further ado, here is the Jesus Door:







I don't have any of the appropriate filters for my camera, so the fluorescent lights have created a bit of a glare in these pictures that you don't actually see in person. So... the invitation is out. If you want to come see the Jesus Door, feel free!

If You're Looking For Jesus (We Have Him and You Can't Have Him!)

Last Sunday evening I was facilitating our current discipleship study, The Way of Prayer,and we were focusing on the chapter that deals with prayer by gazing. As we spoke about icons and other visual aids used in prayer, Catherine reveals that we have a door in the church with Jesus on it.

"Like a picture?" I ask, "Or in the grain?"

"It's in the grain," she answers, and I am intrigued. I have been at this church for four months now, and I haven't seen Jesus emblazoned on any doors.

The very next morning, when I came to the church I headed straight for the choir room, which is where Catherine claims the Jesus apparition is. As I stepped into the room, I squinted at the door, but couldn't see anything. So I reached out and flipped on the light switch for a little added illumination... and there it was! This wasn't something you had to stare at for a moment to see. This wasn't something that required imagionation. This was Jesus, bright as day, standing there in the wood of the door. He had a big burly beard, two eyes, a heart in the center of his chest, two hands at his side. Where the stigmata should have appeared were two pieces of some sort of adhesive tape. I wondered what had once been posted there.

I stood in breathless wonder. I had seen things like this in the paper and on the internet... but somewhere deep inside I wondered if those images were doctored. But this... this was real and it was awesome.

I later told another member of the church, Joan (name changed for privacy) that I had witnessed this door. I expressed how amazed I was and I said we should take a picture of it and let people see it.

"Ted was the the one who noticed it," she said, referencing an old pastor who had served a 13 year stint back in the eighties and early nineties and seems to be a saint to this church, "He told us not to tell anyone because we'd have every nut in the world coming in here."

I stood in dumbfounded silence. Joan is prone to exaggerations and had a tendency to put her own words into other people's mouths, so I couldn't be for sure if the pastor had actually said that, or if Joan was trying to persuade me not to reveal it. This is the same woman who does not want me help they poor when the come in, so who knows?

However, the implications of what she said was staggering: We have Jesus and we're going to keep him to ourselves! What is that about? No wonder American churches are dwindling. No wonder we can't grow. We have Jesus, but we won't share him with you. We'll beat you over the head with our Bibles and demand you live, act, dress, talk, and think like us... but Jesus is ours and until you conform to us, you can't have him.

So, if any of you out there is looking for Jesus, he's at First UMC in Welch, WV.

Returning to the Blogosphere

Things have been insanely busy lately; so, I have unfortunately neglected my blog. However, I am back to the blogosphere this week, and with nothing much to say!

As far as my ministry goes, I can’t help but feel that I have spent so much time in meetings talking about ministry that I haven’t been able to do ministry. It seems every week I am on the road (you can’t get anywhere from Welch, so everything’s a half-day drive). It doesn’t help that the West Virginia Conference of the United Methodist Church seems to have realized in the last months of 2008 that this was supposed to be a year about evangelism and that we need to have lots and lots of workshops and retreats about it.

So, in September I was off to a two-day clergy mentoring retreat that was supposed to teach us “provisional members” how to respond to mentors while our mentors learned how to be mentors. (It was a 4-½ hour drive to get there.) I’m not sure what I was supposed to get out of it aside from two days lost from my ministry. As soon as that ended we began our “residency” program. This two-day event was slightly more beneficial (as far as “getting-to-know-you-sessions” can be). When that came to an end we had to jump into our cars and rush to Summersville for “Commission Possible.” This was an event that was really pushed by our Bishop and I desperately wanted to go, but that sermon wasn’t going to write itself. I opted to bail out of that event and made the long drive back to Welch so that I could “sermonate.”

I had a week to catch up on all that I could not accomplish during the week on the road and then I was back on the road to attend “Pastor’s School.” This was an event that I did get a lot of useful information out of, and I did thoroughly enjoy worship that I didn’t have to lead… but it was another week away from my church, and ultimately, away from my ministry.

Since then I have been in no less than two meetings a week and have been frantically filling out forms for our yearly charge conference…

And then, this past Thursday, we had to hit the road again for a district pastor’s meeting at which the District Superintendent gave us a parable about “fishermen” who talk about fishing, study fishing, think about fishing… but never actually fish. The question was, Are they really fishermen? It was a jab at us… if all we do is talk about evangelism, are we evangelists? I say no… but why pass out a parable that makes fun of people who meet to discuss “fishing”, when you yourself have called the meeting?


On a lighter note: The leaves are changing. A little east of Welch the leaves are at their peak, so I took a drive this weekend to enjoy them. Colorado had Aspen gold, which is beautiful… but that Aspen gold just doesn’t hold a candle in the wind to the bright vibrant colors of the East. Eye-popping red, fire orange, day-glo yellow… I have missed this palette of colors and am so grateful to see them again.

Today, I grabbed take-out for lunch and ate in the car as I drove through the county, taking in the scenery. I couldn’t help but think about the difference between living here and living in Denver. In Denver, I had to give a ten-digit phone number when I handed it out. Here, I give the last four digits. Currently West Virginia only has one area code (soon to be two) and Welch only has one prefix (not changing any time soon). In Denver I felt suffocated by the constant stream of traffic, noise, and buildings. Here, a good number of the buildings are abandoned and being overtaken by the forests and I can sit on my front porch for an hour and not see a car go by. In Denver, I had to climb in my car and drive over an hour to get to scenery that felt more at home (the mountains.) Here, I am always in the mountains. No matter where you are or where you are going, if you are in West Virginia, you have to navigate a mountain: you go up the mountain, down the mountain, around the mountain, over the mountain, and sometimes through the mountain… I love it!

Peace and blessings!

Working Holidays... God Bless 'Em!

I have just returned from the Convocation on the Rural Church sponsored my Duke Divinity School. Generally, the convocation is only open to North Carolina residents, but on this particular occasion, they allowed ten members of the West Virginia Annual Conference to attend.

I am extremely grateful for the opportunity to attend the convocation and thoroughly enjoyed the brief stay at Myrtle Beach. I sat in on some very good workshops and learned quite a bit from the presenters… however; I have to admit that I spent the biggest portion of the time conflicted by the lavish luxury we were all enjoying.

It was clear from the offset that this convocation was as much about relaxation as it was about sharing knowledge. And that is fine. Most ministers are guilty of not taking enough time to truly Sabbath or to recharge before they begin a new program, a new week, or a new ministry. So, a few days basking in the sun on the beaches of the East Coast are a much-needed rest.

The conflict for me emerges from the fact that we were housed at the Sheraton, enjoying catered meals, and expensive hotel rooms. On the back of the door was the standard posting announcing the most that this hotel would be allowed to charge for the room in which I was staying. A rate that was in excess of $300 per night means that one night in the Sheraton cost more than a month’s rent for the people who live in my community. Imagine how much we could have done if we had stayed at a Holiday Inn further inland and gave the rest of that money to providing housing relief for the working poor?

I sat in a room surrounded by highly educated people, who often had no concept of the life being lived by McDowell County residents just four hours north of them. The stereotypes about West Virginians were overwhelming as I spoke to person after person. Some had traveled through the area and were awestruck by the beauty of the Appalachians. Some had come to McDowell County on mission trips and were saddened by the extreme poverty. Yet, not one of the people I spoke to actually knew that there is an Appalachia that most of us know that exist somewhere between those two extremes of romanticism and total degradation.

Mostly though, I was thrown off-kilter by the nonchalant way in which we accepted our meals from the working class who dressed in their confining uniforms and stood ready to swoop in and carry away our plates as soon as we had laid down our forks. One course was carried away as another course was brought in and when dinner was over most of us sitting in that dining room could not tell you the name of any one of our servers.

What does that say about our ministry when we work in rural communities, often surrounded by the working class and we don’t take the time to get to know them? Have we let our divinity school educations stand in the way of reality? Have we spent so much time studying about theology that we have forgotten praxis? Have we become so preoccupied by the discussion about Jesus that we have forgotten to be the hands and feet of Jesus here on earth?

Given the opportunity, I know I would return to the convocation again…I only hope that between now and then I find a way to reconcile the seeming hypocrisy between the life I am living and the life I preach about.

These Is My Legs

The first day I climbed the steps to Sister Jones’ house sitting high above Court Street, I ascended the hill with my heart in my throat. It’s not that I was afraid of Sister Jones; but I had no idea what to expect once I landed on her porch. I knew she was “ninety-six years young” and in poor health… but what exactly “poor health” meant was the mystery. I was filled with anxiety about my abilities in pastoral care.

But the moment she greeted me at the door with her Southern drawl beckoning me to “c’mon in, c’mon in”, I knew I was entering the lair of a great sage.

Sister Jones is perhaps the most well known person in town. If something needs to be done, Sister Jones is whom you turn to. If you need to find someone or learn something about the town, Sister Jones has the information. And if you want an inspirational lecture about how to live your life, Sister Jones has a good many on hand that she can deliver at a moment’s notice.

So, I entered her home and sat in an antique chair and waited patiently as nurses set to work on Sister Jones’ legs. For years Sister Jones has been nursing an “ulcer” that forms on the inside of her right ankle. She would care for it until it seemed to heal, but eventually it would reopen… over the years it became gradually worse. Now, she is left with a large, gaping wound on her foot that will not heal. Perhaps it is her age, poor circulation, or the years of medical neglect she has suffered, but it just will not close.

The nurses on call are frustrated by their inability to change the doctor’s orders or to offer her an alternative that will ease her discomfort… but Sister Jones doesn’t complain and she doesn’t raise too much of a stink. And the nurses are grateful that she’s easy to deal with, especially when they have to deliver the bad news that her leg isn’t healing. But Sister Jones proudly proclaims that it is looking better, anyway.

Once the nurses have left, Sister Jones begins telling me about one of the other women who offers her medical care. That woman doesn’t seem to care much for Sister Jones’ input and acts as if Sister Jones is simply too old to be of sound mind… but the woman wraps her leg too tight every time and often hurts her when she’s cleaning the wounds.

“Maybe I shouldn’t say nuthin’ to her ‘bout her job,” Sister Jones wonders out loud. But before I can encourage her to speak up for herself when she feels she is not being treated right, Sister Jones proudly proclaims, “But these is my legs, and they’s the only ones I got!”

I smile at her refusal to accept anything less than respect from anyone… but it would take me a while to understand just how subversive her statement had been.

Sister Jones is an African-American woman who was raised in a segregated America during the age of Jim Crow. Those who encountered her would automatically count two strikes against her: one for the shape of her body and one for the dark hue of her skin.

But Sister Jones knew in her heart that neither of those things were strikes against her and that even if America wanted to be obsessed with her gender or race, she would not allow it to stop her from achieving all that she wanted.

She was president of the Homemaker’s Association… although most of the women who know her now would never characterize her as a homemaker. Maybe that’s why she held the post for so many years: to subvert the myth of a woman’s place being in the home. Sister Jones worked… she worked for doctors and she worked all over town in jobs that meant everyone knew who she was. And then she began her own catering business and continued to run it until she decided to “retire.”

Of course, women like Sister Jones never really retire. She dove headfirst into volunteer activities… not that this was new to her. She had been volunteering her whole life to one cause or another, but now she could put all her energy into it. When it came time to raise money for the Susan G. Komen Walk for the Cure, Sister Jones’ knees wouldn’t allow her to participate. But she raised more money than anyone else in the region… and then she came back and did it the next year, too.

She has spent her life advocating for women, children, the church, and anyone else she saw who was in need of an advocate. Sister Jones never backs down from a fight, and she never assumes that she can’t do something well because the rest of the world thinks she shouldn’t be able to.

When the world told her she should keep her mouth shut and hide in a kitchen, she burst out of that dark room and into the light of day. When the world told her she was inferior because her skin was too dark, she stood up and demanded respect. Now she can’t help but feel the world is telling her she’s too old to know what is good for her… but she won’t accept it.

“These is my legs,” she proudly proclaims, laying ownership to her body, to her will, to her health, to her well being, and to her fate.

Sister Jones knows that every part of her body was lovingly crafted by the God that has walked with her through these ninety-six years, holding her up when life tried to knock her down and lifting her up so that all could see what a child of God can do to change the world. There is no one in this world that can strip her of her dignity and her freedom. And should someone try, Sister Jones will be there to put them in their place with simple words of great wisdom like, “These is my legs.”

I stood by her, one hand holding hers and the other resting on her back as I offered a prayer, but when I opened my eyes I knew that I was gazing into the face of Christ… I had climbed her steps, worried that I would not be a blessing to this woman. I descended those same steps, knowing that in that precious hour, I had been blessed.

Decomposing King Coal

McDowell County was once a thriving place. Sure, there were many problems, a fact that would be foolish to ignore… but there was also life in this place. This county once produced more coal than any other place in the world… but that was when coal was king.

At that time a tiny little McDowell County town, Bramwell, West Virginia boasted the population with the largest percentage of millionaires in the world. The streets were lined with mansions and the city seemed to glisten with the opulence of money.

Welch, West Virginia was a thriving center for commerce. The population was significant and people came from all around the county to shop here. A typical Saturday would see McDowell Street clogged with cars and foot traffic as people took their day off to head into town to look at the latest fashions or dine at one of the local restaurants. Youth from other towns would come to Welch for the theater, and the town was absolutely hopping.

Now there are very few businesses on McDowell Street and the few buildings that are still open are housing government offices and not business. True, there is a new theater, which has brought a little life back into the town, but overall, the booming days of McDowell Street are long gone and the buildings that stand are ghostly reminders of the death of King Coal.

A few years ago, Welch was virtually wiped out by the Tug Fork River’s hundred-year flood. Some thought it was the deathblow to this sleepy little town, and in many ways it seems to have been.

Coal had already fallen from its mighty throne and the once congested city had been witnessing a dwindling population, watching its numbers shrink with every year. Welch was on the verge of death.

When the flood came, it tore through McDowell Street and laid waste building after building. A few lucky business owners would clean up and reopen; most just closed their doors and never looked back. The buildings stood empty and abandoned. The water damage combined with the dead economy meant they could not be sold. The cost of repairs was too great to justify even trying. The town quickly fell into a state of disrepair.

Now, the leadership of Welch is desperately trying to resurrect the beauty that was once Welch. Of course, this means realizing King Coal is not going to rise from his cold tomb to breath life back into Central Appalachia. So, the mayor has begun a dismantling program… slowly but steadily taking the town that took so long to build apart. Every day a new building comes down, memories fall into the dust, and someone laments about the way things used to be.

“This was one big, long building,” Rick tells me as he drives me along the Elkhorn River, “But the mayor had it torn down. The flood just did it in.”

Now a brick wall and cast-iron fence stand as a tribute to a “beautification” project designed to make Welch pleasant to the beholder and no longer an eyesore.

“They’re gonna put in a park where those buildings are now,” Betty tells me as she gestures toward McDowell streets where heavy equipment is bringing low yet another building, her voice both optimistic and pessimistic at the same time. “That’s what they say, anyway.”

She is an elderly woman who has heard her share of government promises and seen what “improvements” do to Appalachia. But, she holds on to the hope that things will get better. If Welch, the ghost town disappears, maybe the four wheelers from the popular Hatfield-McCoy ATV Trail will come to the new-and-improved Welch and spend some of their money.

It’s hard to explain to the people here that there are places where growth is happening. There are cities where they just can’t build fast enough… but in McDowell County the coal companies have left behind a world of abandoned equipment, buildings, and houses. It is a place that has not known growth for a long time.

Every day that I have been in Welch has been a sad awakening to the death of King Coal. "This is the legacy," I think to myself, "of the coal barons." I drive through the towns named for the barons, their wives, and the companies they built and I think about the irony of it all. The death that once touched the lives of the men, women, and children who would crawl back under a mountain has finally become visible. What had once been concealed in the dark depths of the earth has been brought into broad daylight. Everywhere you turn, everywhere you go, you come face to face with the decomposing body of King Coal.


Some Economic Facts About McDowell County
[US averages in brackets]

Population Trends:
1990—35,233
2000—27,329 (23% drop since 1990)
2007—22,991 (16% drop since 2000)

Average household size—2.42 [US=2.59]
Average family size—2.92 [US=3.14]
(To the woman who told me to push birth control in Appalachia to solve its problems.)

Vacant Housing—17.8% [US=9.0%]

High School graduate or higher—50.0% [US=80.4]
Bachelors degree or higher—5.6% [US=24.4]

Disabled—39.7% [19.3%]

In Labor Force—32.4% [63.9%]

Median Household Income—$16,931 [US= $41,994]
Median Family Income—$20,496 [US=$50,046]
Per Capita Income—$10,174 [US=$21,587]

Families Below Poverty Line—33.8% [US=9.2%]
Individuals Below Poverty Line—37.7% [12.4%]

Preachy About Green Myopia

I am settling in quite nicely here in Welch, WV. You never really know how much you have missed something until it’s gone and then back again. Southern hospitality was something I craved during my time in Colorado, but I never realized just how much I wanted (no, needed) it until I cam back to Appalachia.

However, I have never seen Southern West Virginia in the way that I have seen it since I’ve been back. Having spent three years away from here makes the difference. But, not only did I spend three years away, I spent it in one of the nation’s wealthier states, living in a city that throws money around like its confetti. After watching so much wasteful spending and gluttonous living standards, returning to a place in decay is shocking.

Welch was once a thriving community… When coal was still king, anyway. But coal is not king any longer, at least not to the folks who live in the coalfields. Jobs are scarce and unreliable and the coal industry really does not support the local economy as it once did. But coal is still the cultural norm here, so folks do not speak ill of it.

I took a long drive through the country the other day and as I neared Gary, WV I passed an abandoned piece of mine property. An old, rusted piece of equipment still stood as a ghostly reminder of yesterday and on the side was spray-painted the words, “Coal keeps the light on.” It’s the catch phrase of the coal industry in these parts and has become a rallying battle cry for those who feel their livelihoods are being threatened by the environmentalist-driven push toward green energies.

There was truth in that relic, though. It stands abandoned and forgotten by the original builders, left to rot into non-existence by a society that used it for all its worth and then turned its back on it, and still cherished by the people who labored in its shadows for so long, who cling to hope that it will one day glisten in the sun as it did once before.

The people of Southern West Virginia have been treated much the same way. For generations they labored at a dangerous and thankless job and told they weren’t worth anything by the society that used up the coal they mined. So they bent over and crawled, day after day, into the dangerous mines with no advocate to help them. When they decided that they were worth something, they had to fight against the coal companies, society, and the government to win basic rights to a safe working environment. Even still, they worked one of the most dangerous jobs in the world. And those who survived their years in the mines were cast aside when they grew old, their lungs as black as the coal they dug and slowly turning to rock in their chests. They were left to slowly suffocate to death, and no one blinked an eye. But they fought for recognition then, too. And now they have come under attack again. The same people who grew up in the privilege awarded by the coalminer’s hard work… who learned in schools powered by their coal, in building built from steel that came from their coal… those same people have turned on the coal industry with a rabid vengeance, forgetting that it was the greedy demands of American society that dug those mines and killed those men who crawled into them. And as America fights to shut down the mines, there is little mention of what will happen to the young men and women who need those jobs in the mine to keep their children free of poverty.

Now, I am all for progress. I am all for green energy sources. And I am all for being good stewards of this land. Coal is a thing of the past, and the day will come that we will no longer need it… in an ideal world, that day will come, that is… but I worry about the people.

American society told the people of Appalachia that their way of existing wasn’t good enough and they needed to enter the industrial period. The people of Appalachia did and they paid a dear price. They lost their land to greedy swindlers; they lost their lives to an energy-hungry America. Now, they are being told that their industry is evil and that it shouldn’t exist. But where is the promise of work? Where is the promise of life?

The green movement needs to go forward, but it should not take another step until it has added to its agenda a fight for the humanity of the people that gluttonous living standards disregarded long ago. After all, it was the very greed of cities like Denver that dug the dark tombs of the Appalachian coal miners. The green movement cannot condemn the coal dust-stained hands of Appalachia until it has acknowledged its own bloodstained hands.

American Hypocrisy 101

I'm packing up my little apartment in anticipation of my move six days from now.  As I am sorting through my stuff I am struck by how little of it I actually need.  

Stacked along my walls are boxes and boxes of books that I have already read and will never read again... yet I am so attached to them that I will not part with them.

Mingled amongst the books are binders filled with papers I have written, notes I have taken, and random thoughts I have scribbled.  I will never review them.  And indeed, there are many notebooks that made their way from West Virginia with them that I have never opened in the three years I have lived in Denver.  I have mustered up the strength to toss those in the trash this go around, rather than haul them back to West Virginia.

I have long argued against American consumerism... and yet, it would seem that I have given in to the American fetish of collecting.

It causes me to take pause and reflect over the past three years spent at Iliff School of Theology.  Iliff is a liberal school.  Depending on whom you speak to, it is either a radically liberal school, a liberal elitist school, or a school of liberal fundamentalism.  I tend to favor the latter description.

However, as I said in the midst of those predominantly white liberals, listening to the constant rants and raves of the left, I heard a condemnation of American ideals... yet these people embraced those ideals whole heartedly.  They drove SUVs, Mercedes, and other nice, gas guzzling cars.  They lived in upscale suburbs and in places like Boulder (if you're from Colorado or have ever lived there, you know what that means).  They have more floor space than they need, yet they fill it up.  They have so many clothes that they could wear a different outfit every day and still have clothes left over at the end of the month.  They eat at nice restaurants, paying enough for one meal to feed a family in the two-thirds world for a month.  

How much does that sort of liberalism serve us?  If we are willing to acknowledge our privilege, it's a step.  But if we end with that, we have done nothing.  Sometimes I think my ultra-conservative father has progressed more than these so-called progressives.  At least my dad recognizes that he earns more, spends more, and has a higher quality of life than many people in this world.  Granted, he does nothing to demand more equality or justice... but at least he acknowledges that he has privilege and cherishes it, not wanting to give it up.

The liberals I have encountered over the past three years cling to their privilege, and pretend to be rejecting it.  It doesn't do a starving child in South Africa, orphaned by AIDS any good.  

I'm leaving Denver a little confused, a little angry, a little frustrated, and thoroughly disgusted with the American Left.  Yet, I have been disgusted with the American Right for quite some time.  So, I guess this move is also a journey to discover a better way... there has to be a better way... right?  Right?

Setting Out on a New Adventure

Well... I'm resetting my life, so I thought I should reset my blog as well. I haven't exactly been an active blogger... in fact, if I post a new blog once every six months, I'm doing pretty good.

But, I'm packing up my little apartment in Denver and preparing for the cross-country drive back to West Virginia. It's been a fast three years, and yet every time I see those rolling green hills I realize how long I have been gone. I ventured way to far from the familiar and at times paid the price. But for the most part, it was an experience I needed so that I could see just how wide my wings could spread.

Now I'm leaving the shadows of the Rockies and heading home, knowing full-well where I belong. With my index-card-of-a-diploma and a hunger for practical ministry, I'm heading to Welch, West Virginia where I will be pastor of two churches. I'm excited, and I'm scared... but I know it is right.

With the new commitment and the new life, I feel a renewed sense that I should start blogging again. So, here I go again,  re-launching this site (for about the third time)... although I am no longer an Appalachian Abroad. Yet, once you've left the hills, you'll spend the rest of your life trying to find your way back and won't quite get there. Just ask Homer Hickam... he knows how it feels to be both an insider and outsider and never quite fitting in again. But you never can leave.