Star Wars

Out on Judy Branch you can really see the stars. And being a child of the 70s and early 80s, a good long session of star gazing leads my mind to drift to the epic stories that reigned my childhood. Yes, Star Wars. Princess Lei will always be trapped somewhere inside of me, fighting so fiercely (and with attitude) against the evil empire.

When I was in grad school, the most important book I read was John Gaventa's dissertation: Power and Powerlessness: Quiessence and Rebellion in an Appalachian Valley. For me, he was the first person who ever laid out the complexity of the power relationships that cause all the horrible inequalities we see happening around the world today. I still can't get my head around it all, and I have a feeling that this is one of the reason's I'm nestled as far back as I can possibly get in this holler. I need a place to escape to each and every day. And Judy Branch is the ideal place to go.

Besides being raised with the ideals of the small band of rebels of Star Wars, I was raised by a family that somehow instilled in both myself and my brother that we should not sit by while others suffer. I was raised to think and to care and to try to make a difference. My brother took this literally, first as a vigil anti fighting neo-nazis, now as a paramedic. I took to the hollers, trying to figure out how to make my homeland a place that people can still make a living and find a community.

What I've learned: It's not easy trying to make the world a better place, no matter how you go about it. Sometimes the only place I can bear to be is way back here at the head of Judy Branch. Let the deer nibble at my garden, the poison ivy brush against my feet and the racoons raid my compsost bin.... These challenges are welcome compared to the unthinkable beasts of the rest of the world.

When I first read Tolkein, I must have been 8 or 9 years old. I decided right then that there was NO way that I was human. I was of Elvin stock, and that was that. There was no way that I could ever understand the ways of Man. There was no way I could ever be on of THEM. Somehow, I missed the boat.

I still feel that way.

Thunderstorms are approaching Judy Branch. Time to switch off the electric window to the world and read myself to sleep by candle light.