Rebooting the Reboot
Rural Reflections in 2024
Happy New Year!
Welcome back to Rural the Reflections — the Reboot, version 2.0. Despite a more-eventful-than-expected holiday break, I have had some time to rest, regroup, and decide what the next steps in this project will be. I’ve loved the responses to Ruth’s and my work so far, and I look forward to more enriching conversations with readers near and far in 2024
At the same time, sometime late this fall, I started sensing a different direction I’d like things to take. I have two reasons for this:
1. I want to make sure Ruth’s voice has center stage most of the time. Bringing her words to whole new groups of readers was a major reason for starting this project, after all. And yet I get so caught up in my own musings that I fear some readers may be scrolling mindlessly by the time I bring her words onto the page (not to mention those reading via e-mail may have the post cut off before she gets to say much at all).
2. Speaking of getting caught up in my own musings, I have been beating myself up for not spending more time on my book, itself inspired by and in many ways a tribute to Ruth’s life and work. There are only so many hours in a day and I have to devote some of them to my “real” (read: paid with benefits) job, some to my family, some to sleep and exercise and sustenance, and the rest, of which there never seem to be enough, to reading and writing. As much as I love writing the rambling pieces that accompany Ruth’s columns, I need to redirect some of that time and energy toward the book and the occasional short story for my fiction writing group.
With that in mind, I’ve decided that most weekends, I will post a column Ruth wrote from some specific month or day (a January 12 column the second week of January, for example) and with it, a wee bit of context. I am especially interested in looking at what was going on in the world when she was writing and where my family and I happened to be at that time. I’ll put a limit on my own word count in these posts so that Ruth’s words can more brightly shine.
Then, at the beginning of each month, I will write an essay, in the Montaigne sense of the word, where I try playing around with whatever happens to be on my mind. Most will be inspired by what I’ve learned from reading and researching Ruth’s writing, though some, like this post, may be very much their own creation.
Context is everything
A couple of things happened during my time away that solidified my desire to present Ruth’s writing with some context and little else. Maybe it’s because I’m a writer, or maybe it’s because I’m an academic, or maybe it’s just how I’m wired (probably some combination of the three), but I am awfully quick to leap to analysis and interpretation rather than spending time with the thing itself, whatever the thing in question happens to be.
The first of these two triggers was a letter in the New York Times in which some guy1 wanted to know why he should pay to help flood victims in Kentucky when it was basically, according to him, our own dumb fault for voting for Republicans.
First of all, this assessment of our Commonwealth reeks of stereotype and too much mass media and TV. I can imagine the echo chamber the letter-writer lives in because I have been in it myself. That we continually have to tell people Kentucky is actually a diverse state home to all kinds of people, including nearly unmatched depths of creativity, is beyond exhausting.2
Secondly, it reveals profound ignorance of the role coal has played in our state’s culture and economy, the ways in which people and the land have been robbed even as they were sold a false tale of shared wealth and power. There is much to say about this, but there are many who do so far better than I can ever hope to. Unlike the letter-writer, I don’t revel in putting my ignorance on display.
Thirdly, it ignores the fact that the counties most devastated by the July 2022 floods voted to re-elect Governor Andy Beshear, a confirmed…wait for it…Democrat. The national media may have told you that women’s right to choose appropriate healthcare propelled him back to office, and in part, I think that’s true. More than that, though, I believe, was faith in a man who showed up not only promising but also delivering solutions, for example by working with FEMA to get corporate and individual landowners to make land available so families and communities can rebuild on higher ground.
Finally, of course, it ignores the fact that as a Californian, he is “choosing” to live in a state plagued by earthquakes, fires, and any number of other disasters, a state that diverted water from Indigenous peoples so that settlers could have green lawns in where deserts once sprawled.3 Talk about ignoring context…
The other event that helped clarify my thinking happened still closer to home and involves people whose story is not mine to share. I will say only this—when I go back to work and people ask me how Christmas break was, I’ll wish they’d think before opening their mouths. I’ll suspect that like me, most people have complicated answers to such questions and wonder if they are better left unasked.
Out loud, I will say I was glad to have time to regroup and that it was far too short because really, no matter how a break turns out, it pretty much always is. In my heart, I will remember a quiet Christmas day and a few magical holiday meals. I will remember a gracious Airbnb host, the gas station clerk who wouldn’t take my money, and the heart-warmth of family and trusted friends. I’ll recollect how the dark moments have helped me better see these moments of light as I cocoon myself behind my office door and focus on getting my work done.
In other words, I’ll know the whole context but I won’t be sharing it. The details of these stories don’t belong to those outside our innermost circle, and besides, most asking that question are just making small talk, something at which I almost always epically fail.
By way of an abrupt conclusion
Anyway, dear readers, now you have the plan and probably more than you wanted or needed of my rationale. Expect to hear a lot from Ruth in the next 3 weeks and less from me. I’ll be back in February.
You cannot imagine the expletives and insults I typed and then erased before settling on “some guy.”
Seriously, it is excruciating to limit myself to referring to this writer merely as “some guy”!
See Kendra Atleework’s Miracle Country for a fabulous account of water use and misuse in the so-called Golden State. Her book is what mine wants to be when it grows up.