There’s a special kind of peace that comes from easing down a country road on a warm summer evening with the windows rolled down and the radio doing all the talking. You’re not going anywhere […]
There was a time in my childhood when the greatest luxury in the world came in the form of a grape soda in a glass bottle. Not the plastic kind that always tasted faintly like […]
Every town has a story it likes to claim, a little spark of legend that gets passed around at barber shops, church suppers, and front porches. Some of those stories are tall tales, some are […]
I was seven and a half years old when the Rock ’n’ Roll Express came crashing into my world like a double dropkick to the soul. It was 1985, and I was already knee-deep in […]
My youngest daughter is celebrating her birthday today, and one of our long standing traditions is the birthday girl gets to pick what she wants for Sunday dinner that week. We had that dinner this […]
If you drive far enough down the backroads of Southwest Virginia, past the rolling pastureland and the quiet hollers where the mountains fold in on themselves, you’ll find a place called Plasterco. It is small […]
There are certain things that tell you you’re in the South long before you ever see a road sign. Kudzu on the power lines. A porch swing that’s been there longer than the house. And […]
At some point in Appalachian adulthood, you stop checking the weather app and start consulting the Farmer’s Almanac like it’s a sacred text. I don’t remember when this shift happened, but it was subtle. One […]
There are places in every small town that do more than sit on the map. They settle into the memory. In Chilhowie, one of those places has always been the Rainbow Motel and Restaurant. Long […]
Mountain hospitality is a funny thing. Outsiders think it means we’re all sweet tea and porch swings, waving at strangers like we’re in a parade. And sure, we can be friendly. But real mountain hospitality […]
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