This must be the place: ‘There are things you can replace, and others you cannot’

A&E Columns

This must be the place: ‘There are things you can replace, and others you cannot’

The Orange Peel in Asheville. Garret K. Woodward photo

Hello from the depths of Panacea Coffee Company in the Historic Frog Level District of Waynesville. At the moment, I’m sitting at the prized table. If you’ve ever been to Panacea, you know which one I’m talking about, the one on the second tier, next to the big window looking down upon Richland Creek.

Today is the ideal writing weather. Perfect, actually. Dimly-lit café with natural light pouring in from cloudy skies overhead, steady raindrops trickling down the big ole windows. A sugar-free vanilla cappuccino within reach, soon to be accompanied by a breakfast sandwich and fruit cup on this lazy, drizzly Wednesday morning. This exact scene is my zen zone for the written word.

We just finished our weekly editorial meeting in the newsroom, and now I’m able to slip my collar until next Tuesday when we kick the paper out the door to the printer. Sure, I have an “office,” but mostly it’s a lonely desk where my mail gets placed, usually picked up later in the week when I roll by to see if my publisher has anything urgent for me to work on before the weekend.

The rest of the week? Like clockwork, I’m in Panacea typing away. This mood and setting is what I need to get stories done. You couldn’t pay me a million dollars to sit in an office under fluorescent lighting to conjure words and sentiments from the depths of my mind and memory. I need space to breathe, both physically and emotionally. God bless all those great, local coffee shops.

And yet, my mind is heavy today. In truth, it usually is. The heaviness doesn’t drag me down, it’s more about trying to hold onto life as best I can and be able to make sense of it all, the nothing and everything of daily existence. Lately, the heaviness is coming from people, places and things around me, the planets and comets of humanity that orbit my current position in this universe.

To that, two weeks from today, I’ll be packing up the rusty, musty pickup truck and making the 1,002-mile trek above the Mason-Dixon Line to my native North Country of Upstate New York. As much as I truly enjoy returning to the Adirondack Mountains this time of year (before the bugs and the tourists), this go-round is for more somber, sorrowful reasons. You see, my best friend from home recently passed away and I’ll be back in town for the memorial service.

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Not really the situation I had anticipated when I was initially planning out a visit home earlier this year. But, here we are, and such is life, eh? Currently, my thoughts are drifting towards the service and who may or may not show up. Faces not seen in years, many not in decades, some since high school graduation some 23 years ago. Faces of my youth now adorned with well-earned wrinkles and spots of evergrowing grey hair (myself included).

A lot of those faces and dusty memories have been jogged in my head as of late, especially with The Wallflowers show recently at The Orange Peel in Asheville. The 1990s rock darlings tore through a raucous set of hit melodies from a seemingly simpler time and place, in my long gone teenage life and probably yours, too. And it was “6th Avenue Heartache” that really tugged at my heartstrings: “I got my fingers crossed on a shooting star, just like me, just moved on.”

Walking out of the venue towards the parking garage on Biltmore Avenue, the streets were silent. Not many folks around, either. Restless thoughts about my late friend, about my aging parents back home in the old farmhouse, about my continued work for the newspaper and what that might look like moving forward, and about the unknown state of this country and the greater planet.

The late morning rain showers have slowed up. The brush along Richland Creek is bright green and bushy, a sign that spring is transitioning to summer. It’s also a sign that my summer travel plans are quickly appearing on the horizon. Head up to New England next month to work on this current bluegrass book project? Another loop around the Rocky Mountains in July to wander and ponder and cleanse my soul as only that region can offer?

Who knows? Who cares? It’s all about pushing forward with your head held high. Keep it simple stupid (KISS), as they say. Be kind and know that kindness breeds kindness. Pet all dogs (especially the not-so-nice ones). Help your neighbor, the same goes for strangers in need. Immerse yourself in art and see live music. Touch grass and disappear into the depths of Mother Nature often. Oh, and call your parents if you’re lucky enough to still have them around.

It reminds me of this tune by Strangefolk, a beloved jam-rock act from the North Country. They were musical gods growing up in the Champlain Valley. All of us music freaks would blast their albums cruising the backroads of Clinton County and beyond. Especially the number “Roads”: “People come and people go, winds that howl and winds that blow, and you, you got to let it go…time and time and time again, circles break and lines they bend.”

It’s like that journal entry of mine from Dec. 25, 2007, when I was 22 years old and leaving my hometown of Plattsburgh, New York, the next morning for my first reporting gig in Driggs, Idaho:

“I was standing alone on the farmhouse balcony. The distant cellular-towers blinked in their own red-light rhythms. Railroad tracks in the adjacent field glistened under the moonlight. The frozen landscape of Clinton County remained silent. All were in for the night with bellies full from dinner. All was quiet save the occasional barking dog, left outside a few houses down. The sound of a speeding car echoed down Route 22. I watched the vehicle. It zoomed by my field of vision. I wondered where it was heading. Who was in it? But, soon, someone would be wondering the same when I crossed theirs in the coming hours and days. The road was silent again…”

Life is beautiful, grasp for it, y’all.

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