Blood dripped from his fingertips into the rain-soaked earth. Even though the land couldn’t accept another drop of moisture, it seemed hungry for the lifeblood offering the man unknowingly gave. I watched hypnotized as drops landed in the mud with a soundless splat. The mire absorbed the red splatter, like quicksand devouring a car, until no trace remained, not a single drop to remind me of this man’s wound.

Everyone I encountered that hot August day in 2022 bore the scars of this flood.

It seemed this land was hungry for blood, having lost its battle with Mother Nature, who had hurled a wall of water, cars, trees, homes, and beloved animals down a narrow creek that-on any other day- wouldn’t be deeper than three feet.

The man’s injured hand hung loose at his side as he surveyed what remained of his belongings which were stacked neatly in the back of a truck, leaving plenty of room for more. Inside the home, nothing remained. The lack of personal items was evident in the empty house he and his wife owned, a royal blue structure with doors and windows flung open in a feeble attempt to dry the interior of the unsalvageable building. I noticed their furnishings then, stacked neatly at the street: sofa, bed, refrigerator. 

“Lost all my chickens.” He glanced around the fenced in yard, hopeful for survivors. 

That one sentence encapsulated a deep loss for both the man, and the community. Even the roughest, toughest Appalachian holds a deep affection for poultry. Hill folk work in harmony with their feathered friends. Tossing them table scraps, collecting their offered eggs, calling them by name and, when no one is watching, hugging the little darlings. Hand to heaven, I’ll fight the first person who mocks a full-grown man whose eyes tear up over the loss of his hens. 

“Something in that house is making me sick.” The man’s eyes watered. His face reddened. He turned and coughed into his elbow.

I drew my eyes away from the chain-link fencing with debris wedged in the links. Outside his home, the absence of a water line told me that flood had crested at the roofline. I didn’t ask how he managed to climb atop the roof to survive this calamity. 

“It’s mold, making you sick. You aren’t staying here, are you?”

He glanced at what remained of his rain-soaked life. “Naw.”

I looked at Isaiah, who’d driven me into the Millstone community. By the time I arrived in Kentucky from western North Carolina, I had formed a plan. I am a lineman’s daughter. Lineman’s daughters know that when the weather turns ugly, they don’t see their poppas for weeks. All I needed was to find the linemen. They always were always dispatched to the worst areas first.

I’d taken every single can from the food pantry at the school where I worked. It was August 3, 2022, students were out on break and the folks of Kentucky needed help. Friends, family, and complete strangers helped fill my truck by donating Coleman stoves, medical supplies, sleeping bags, bug spray. I knew there would be plenty of donated water, so I packed salves I’d made for my goats. When trouble like this comes to the hills vets are slammed. Before I left, my 80-year-old dad and I gleaned his garden. A homegrown tomato is a balm to those who’ve lost it all. 

“I’ve always felt drawn to Kentucky,” I said as we filled pasteboard boxes with tomatoes. “I don’t exactly know why.”

“I guess you do,” Poppa said. “I was stationed up there when I was in the Army. Your mom and I lived there for a good while. The great state of Kaintuck is where your momma and me made you.” 

I nodded. Intrigued. Wondering if the essence of this place was embedded deep within my soul? I grew up in Swain County, North Carolina. A place that, at the time, was the poorest county in the state with the highest teenage pregnancy rate. Poverty weighs heavy on the shoulders of Appalachians, regardless of the state they call home. Worried about his daughter, Poppa placed a road Atlas in my hand. “You won’t need this. It’s basically a straight shot to Kentucky, but it’s up hill all the way.”

I knew only one person in all of Kentucky: Joseph. Joseph is a mountain man. Born of these woods, he knows more about the way of this place than anyone with a PhD hammered to their wall. When I needed advice on medicinal plants, goldenseal and ginseng in particular, he was my lifeline. When I saw images of him sitting in his rented trailer in Neon surrounded by water, I knew I had to go.

Letcher County Central High School served as the Distribution Center. Along with a loaded down truck, I also had money in my pocket. Rolls of cash entrusted to me by Facebook friends, many of whom I’d never met.  It didn’t matter that phone service was sporadic, the school was easy to find, just follow the National Guard vehicles. I waited my turn and found a parking spot. I’d worked Distribution Centers before in Gatlinburg when the fires of hell rained down. I knew that if I timed it right, I would catch the power company men as they pulled into the parking lot for lunch. A hot sun baked the pavement and there wasn’t a lick of shade to be had. Power Company vehicles had parked at the far end of the lot, weary workers mingled about, happy to be out of their vehicle. Some men slept in their trucks, their hardhats used to block the sun. This had been my dad’s life for 30-years. His crew was always the first to go, typically to Florida after a hurricane. I knew that every man had someone at home who just wanted the safe return of their loved one.

The Line Crew Foreman wrote on a piece of paper affixed to the metal clipboard, charting their next move after the men had hydrated and taken a brief rest. 

“I’m Renea, a lineman’s daughter. I’ve driven here from western North Carolina.” The words rushed out. “I need one of y’all to take me to the worst of the worst.” I extended my hand. “You know who can’t get out.”

The Foreman eyed me with distain. “Can’t do that.”

I shoved my hand in the pocket of my jeans and presented him with a wad of cash. “Listen. I have this money. It was given to me by people who want to help.” I straightened and stood as tall as any woman who is five feet, zero inches possibly could. “I’m not leaving until I put this money in the hands of people who need help.” My eyes traveled to the faces of each of these strangers. “If you’re worried about liability, I have health insurance and I’m confident no one here has plans on killing me today.” I nodded toward his clipboard. “I’ll write out a legal waiver if you want. . . used to work for a judge.”

The Foreman studied me for a minute. I wasn’t budging. Finally, he spat a stream of tobacco juice. “Isaiah! Put this lady in your truck and take her up the road.”

I smiled. Of course his name would be Isaiah, the one who-back in the days of the Bible said, “Lord, here am I, send me!”

Isaiah maneuvered the bucket truck past orange cones which warned drivers to stay away from dangerous cracks in the road and chunks of asphalt that had fallen away. He pushed us deeper into the mountains as I looked out the window and tried to process what I saw. Imagine for a moment road signs wrapped with debris, powerlines heavy with clothing and furniture. Close your eyes and think about everything you own scattered miles downstream from the place you once called home like yesterday’s unwanted garbage. Few outsiders understand that a home emptied of its contents becomes a floating landfill whose contents settle hither and yon after the waters recede. 

That’s what some people see when they conjure images of Kentucky. They see trash. They see poachers and meth users. They see ignorant hicks thanks to exploited images of a class of people who’ve been written about, and recorded, and used for the financial gain of others until I am sick to my teeth and filled with rage. They don’t –or won’t-see the beauty of this country, or the kindness of these souls who were born into a place like none other. 

“That’s where the water crested,” Isaiah said, his arm jutted out, pointing well above my head. High above the road we traveled, children’s toys hung from tree limbs. I bit back tears. 

“My God. The water was that high? How will anyone recover?”

Isaiah, who had been trapped on his own roof for two days waiting for the water to recede, had no answer.

I’m familiar with sudden cloud bursts and rising water. But this was no ordinary storm. It began with rain-soaked soil. A tree, knowing that is gives life to humans, tries its best to stay upright; it doesn’t ever want to let go from the dirt in which it grows. But even a mighty oak couldn’t hold on under all that rain while also being weighing down with thousands of dripping leaves. The earth loosened and became slickened mud. Then, the earth around the tree shifted. After that, there’s no stopping the chaos that would follow.

It only took one tree becoming entangled with its brothers and sisters, twisting, tumbling, and finally landing in a swollen creek to set in motion what was dubbed a cataclysmic event. The trees floated until stopped, typically when they either snag another tree, or become wedged beneath a bridge.

As I overheard while in the great state of Kaintuck, “Once those trees let go and mud starts moving, Mother Nature has put her britches on and is about to show us who’s boss.”

And show us she did. She showed the world. Except, most news coverage featured populated areas, far away from residents that were washed off Copperhead and Millstone Road. Sound bites and images drive clicks and ratings. Meanwhile, folk like my friend Joseph was cut off from assistance up in the hollers of Neon, Kentucky as were others who had the misfortune of being on the wrong site of the creek when it began to rise. Folk like the scribes gathered at the Hindman Settlement School who found themselves in a desperate situation.

Mother Nature turned a gentle creek where children had sought comfort from the summer heat, into an angry timber-transporting flume that harkened back to logging days. Those trees stacked one on top of each other, trapping mud and water like a beaver dam, collecting toy cars and trampolines, trucks and chicken coops, rising higher and higher, slowly flooding places in the way-back hollers, far away from the mighty river that also struggled to stay contained. 

Then the flume let go.

With a mighty rush of roots and limbs, mud blended with water and headed headlong down the mountain taking out everything in its path, including over fifty bridges in Hazard, Kentucky alone. In a blink, the gentle people of this rural landscape were trapped in homes that would rock from their foundations and crumble like a candy wrapper. There simply was nowhere to go, no time to head to higher ground. 

City folk don’t understand what it feels to be trapped in a home praying that God Almighty will spare you, but Bertha does.

I didn’t know her from Adam’s housecat, but Appalachian folk don’t need proper introductions to show compassion. “Can I give you a hug?” I said, my chin quivering. Out of the corner of my eye I watch Isaiah lower his head. Emotions shook his shoulders. He’d told me his mother had lost her home. When I offered money, he declined saying, “She’ll make it. The people you are about to meet might not.”

The woman could only nod. We fell into each other, broken hearted. Her name is Bertha. Her granddaughter was in the backseat of her car. I don’t need to ask, I already know Bertha was the primary caretaker of this darling child.

“I don’t know what I’ll do,” Bertha looked at her trailer. “No place to go. Places to rent were already sky high and I can barely make this 350 a month rent.” 

Two dogs yipped excitedly from the well-made front porch. Instinctively, I looked at Bertha’s hands. Worker hands. Proud. Strong. Tired. Afraid. Appalachian woman hands. 

I looked at my own hands, helpless as they were to make any significant change in the lives of anyone I would meet.

“I have to carry my boys down the steps to potty. Poor babies, still scared to death to leave the porch.” She turned back to the dogs. 

“I’ll go get you some dog food,” I promised. Now that Isaiah had shown me the way, I would be back. 

Bertha’s neighbor was also scared. He ambled over, wearing the bleary-eyed look of shock. To the inexperienced, his home looked intact. Many homes looked structurally sound from the outside, but upon closer inspection one could see the structure had moved, at least two feet from its foundation.

The man wrung his hands. I wanted to tell him things would get better. But four days had passed since the water crested high above the last registered flood stage and so far, FEMAs hadn’t arrived. They would eventually arrive only to tell this man he wasn’t eligible (he was told to appeal his claim).  Some homeowners received compensation, which maxed out at $ 37,500. Others would move into temporary FEMA housing. All were told, “FEMA was never designed to be a permanent solution.”

Suddenly a truck pulled into Bertha’s gravel driveway. It’s only the second street-legal vehicle I had seen. In the way-back hollers, 4-wheelers were the only thing transporting much-needed food and water. The vehicles hummed non-stop, traveling like hornets heading to protect a disturbed hive. They were loaded down with water, food, hope. People were desperate for runners to bring food from the Distribution Center in town to parched and hungry Hill Folk. I now understood why I saw a caravan hauling 4-wheelers on trailers on my way to Kentucky. 

The man embraced Bertha, “I kept shining my light on your place, praying, Lord, I hope she got out.”

Bertha turned to her dogs and shook her head. “We rode it out.”

Rode it out. In the dead of night. Without power. Without cellphone coverage. Without warning of the roaring tsunami of carnage rushing toward her and everyone downstream. With only her faith and concerned friends desperately shining a flashlight from their own flooding home into her window, Bertha stood in filthy flood water holding her dogs. Her story was but one example of the rebuilding that must occur if these proud folk are to survive.

Why would anyone want to stay? 

Perhaps Roger May, Operations Director of Appalshop, said it best, “When you ask, why don’t you just move? I will not dignify that with a response. Our hand is to the plow, the practice of resurrection is at hand.”

Appalachians inherently know there is a period of silence that settles in after a disaster, a time of reflection when fierce determination takes root, and our shoulders are ready for carrying yet another burden. It seems people of the hills were born to endure hardship.

By now, it was past 5 o’clock and I was so hungry I was shaking. I gave Bertha, her neighbors, Isaiah, and the man I met on the 4-wheeler several boxes of tomatoes but still had more. Not far from the Distribution Center, a line of vehicles snaked through the parking lot and spilled onto the main road. CANE, (Community Agriculture Nutrition Enterprises, Inc), had been open from the get-go. Providing 1,500 meals a day to anyone who walked through their doors, CANE also provided a place for folks to meet with FEMA and for farmers to meet with local representatives. When a flood washes away farmland and pastureland, the rushing water collects valuable layers soil that took centuries to establish, replacing once fertile ground with tons of river rock that requires heavy equipment to clean up. 

Those with intimate knowledge of the land knew this flood couldn’t have come at a worse time. The end of July and the first part of August are peak harvest time, but now, rancid mud replaced a summer bounty and had contaminated everything it touched. Call me biased, but farm folk are the best folk. During my short time at CANE, those who’d been spared the devastation rolled in with corn and beans ripped fresh from the field. Plastic bags of beans sat atop each table waiting for folk to string and break them as they ate a hot meal. Yellowed beans, typically saved for seeds were also in the bags. This was what broke me, the generosity of others who sacrifice the seed beans for next year because a neighbor was hungry now. The loss of heritage seeds without genetic modification will be felt for generations. I quickly left my tomatoes and rushed down the stairs with tears in my eyes only to bump into a woman who grabbed me in a fierce hug and said, “Listen. We’ll make it.” 

She said this as an affirmation. Something she would repeat until everyone around her believed her.

Even for those with insurance, rebuilding wouldn’t come quickly.  In 2023, I returned to Kentucky with a truckload of books and wooden seed catalogs made by Swain County High School students. I’d asked volunteers to donate seeds to fill the catalog so library patrons could acquire them for spring planting. Library Director, Alita Vogel, had reported the previous year that three of the four libraries in the Letcher County District had been damaged. As of July 2025, two of those libraries remain unopened due- in part- to supply chain and permitting delays. When I returned to Kentucky in the spring of 2025 for a workshop with Silas House at Hindman Settlement School, I saw many homes abandoned, including Bertha’s trailer and many other homes along the route I had traveled in 2022. Two months after our first meeting, I learned that Bertha’s cell phone had been disconnected. Month to month plans are common among those living on the fringes between poverty and desperation. This is how folks fall through the cracks. This is why help is still needed years after. We can’t move onto the next catastrophe and forget those whose lives were forever changed. 

Appalachians have always known that surviving takes more than faith and gumption. It takes compassion, kindness, and an exhausting amount of hard work. Western North Carolina and Eastern Tennessee would soon know the pain of loss when hurricane Helene arrived in September 2024 causing catastrophic damage and claiming 108 lives in North Carolina. Over 400 thousand acres of forest was damaged in western North Carolina, not including urban areas such as Buncombe County that lost forty percent of their trees. Tree loss resulted in an increase in wildfires and other ecological concerns such as loss of animal habitat and increased temperatures. Green-thumbed-gardeners across the area began propagating trees and saving seeds. Some collected plastic containers from recycling centers and filled them with seedlings found on their property. Others shipped trees directly to ravaged areas wanting to prettify an area whose vegetation had been stripped bare.

When Helene hit the western North Carolina mountains CANE Kitchen’s Valerie Ison Horn was the first to connect with me and offer her assistance. Those who’ve know loss are often the first to rush in with offers of assistance. I’d also like to believe that we can continue helping each other heal from these events and do our part to help the land also heal. After the water recedes, the real work of rebuilding communities begins.