Hurricane Helene Was Really Bad
I've only very gradually come to understand just how bad Hurricane Helene was. I don't follow the news for the most part. So I was surprised when a friend of mine lost power for a week in South Carolina and also had property damage.
But yesterday I thought to myself "If the hurricane went west of my friends in the Greensboro, NC area, I wonder how Asheville is doing?" Asheville being a town that I have fond memories of from a trip there once. The best date I ever had in my life was in Asheville!
So I looked it up and it was just real, real bad. Heartbreaking! I wouldn't have thought that a mountainous area could get so much flood damage, but of course a lot of development is down in the valleys by the rivers and creeks.
This was all a few days ago. Then, on Saturday, I saw this video:
This is from a content creator I watch sometimes because she's managed to earn a living from self-publishing books, but this video was just her talking about her small town near Asheville being absolutely demolished. She's fine; her house is fine; but she lost her dream job because the bookstore she works at was destroyed and the owner does not plan to rebuild. Her pictures and anecdotes finally hit home for me just how bad this hurricane was; easily the worst since Katrina.
In the video, this creator talks about feeling useless as a writer in a situation like this, and decides that the best she can do is tell the story of what happened to her town, so that maybe some outside help will come in. I am sympathetic to where she's coming from, and I reshare her video in solidarity. Likewise, she has some links to fundraisers in the video description. If you are so inclined I would especially draw your attention to the fundraiser for restaurant workers in Downtown Marshall. The business owner fundraiser looks like it's going to hit its goal, but the fundraiser for the hourly workers at many of those businesses is not doing so well.
