Local mother of two

Local mother of two

An anonymous caller's reflection on the enduring trauma of Tropical Storm Helene and fears about the current national political climate.

English

2 digital audio recordings

mp3

3:48

Hi there, I would like to record anonymously. You can say that I’m a local mother of two. Six months ago, our lives in Western North Carolina turned upside down. It feels like six months and six minutes and six years, all at the same time. There’s a “before the hurricane” that is hard to remember and dream-like, similar to how many of you feel about pre-COVID. The after part is harder to describe. It is dream-like in many ways, nightmare-like in most ways, and also, it’s just life, totally normal, a new normal forever changed. It’s hard to describe the sinking, terrifying feeling of being completely cut off from the outside world. Physically - all roads in and out of Western North Carolina closed. Mentally - no internet, or phone, or power, or water. The girls and thousands of other kids missed a whole month of school, while other kids lost their lives or their parents. The scars of that horrible day continue as wildfires pop up all over the region, especially in previously flooded areas. Debris hampers the ability of the firefighters to contain the fires sufficiently and give the fires more fuel. Our community routinely experiences PTSD with every storm or windy day and with every mandatory fire evacuation notice. Posts on local social media ask, “Is anyone else experiencing flashbacks? Is anyone else not able to sleep?” Fifty commenters respond, “Yes. Will we ever be normal again?” or “Yes. I’m up. Here for you.” I drive around, things look normal until they don’t. The mini landslides on our road, threatening to one day fully give out and pile on our car or a neighbor's. The major intersection I use almost daily - still closed, but should open so soon. The huge tree overhanging the road, leaning precariously - intrusive thoughts of it smashing us, the people in front, or the minivan behind us. I know the sound of a tree falling and smashing metal, so distinct and seared into memory. Swannanoa River Road - buildings completely vanished, massive cliffs with exposed wires, a bridge with no connection to it’s road, a river forever altered and bare, a golf course unrecognizable, MANNA Food Bank filled with debris and sideways trucks, crumpled by the raging waters of Helene. It looks like it happened yesterday. The dust - when I drive through it, my brakes squeak and tremble for days after - a constant reminder with every stop I make that everything changed for my community on September 27, 2024. But there was some good that came out of such horrors. We grew very close as a community, as a family. We were helped by so many wonderful people - family, friends, neighbors, acquaintances, strangers. We learned a lot about survival and water. And now we are rebuilding, rallying around our favorite businesses as best we can, cheering when a family moves back into their house, cheering when construction finally begins after six months of red tape and insurance insanity, celebrating a trail reopening. I’m not sure quite how to end this post without tying our experience to what’s happening in our country. I hope so fiercely that we won’t need to use the survival lessons from Helene to combat and survive fascism. I hope we will successfully fight it before it gets to that point, but I just don’t know. This feels like a second Helene - rushing, raging, destroying our country instead of just our little, cozy, Western North Carolina