Author: Billy Earnest

I Love This Place

Billy Earnest1 Comment

I love this place. I know some of you understand. Waking up here every day feels right to me. The dirt here feels right to me. The air smells good to me here. Being here soothes my soul.

Whenever I leave this place for a while… when I am returning… at the first glance of these beautiful blue mountains in the distance, my heart feels happy.

I love the bears, the wild turkeys, the falcons outside my door. The only ‘God’ I can understand at all…is literally under my feet, & all around me…she holds me to her surface with gravity.

I used to think it was mostly Asheville that I love so much…& I do so love this town, but it’s deeper & bigger than that.
Long before ‘Beer City’…long before all the trendy bullshit…long before Asheville was even a town…Long before my white ancestors came here and claimed this land as their own, taking it away from the people who already lived here…you know the way white people have done throughout history… attacking them, corralling them, murdering them…violating then…”saving” them…marching many of them west… then telling them where they can and can’t live. I am so, so sorry & sad for that. Long before all of that… This beautiful place was here.

Why do I love it here so much? I feel connected to something ancient here…Maybe it’s the little bit of Cherokee blood in me, maybe it’s my grandfather’s ancestry from West Virginia…I don’t know… this place feels right to me. It feels like home.

I love this place.

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