After the deluge

Hurricane Helene stormed through the mountains of North Carolina in late September while my husband and I were visiting my son and his family in Melbourne, Australia. We watched the events unfold an ocean and a continent away. Eventually we saw the photographs of massive amounts of damage in Black Mountain, Swannanoa, Hot Springs, and Asheville. Buildings flooded, interiors ruined, roads washed out, galleries in the River Arts District torn apart. Text messages informed me that the power and the internet were down in our little blue house. There was no way to know what had happened in our woods*creek*meadow, located a bit west of the worst of the hurricane. When I reached out to Tony, our builder, to see if he was ok, he said he was. A day or two later he texted me to say he’d been by the house, and it was fine. We assumed the house would be fine, built on a slope as far up from the creek as it could be built and still stay within the property line.

It took us until November, more than a month after the hurricane, to get to the woods*creek*meadow. Now four months later, in January, we’re back again. I finally have time to write about what we found when we got back here the first time, a landscape altered by the forces of Mother Nature, strong winds and rushing waters.

Though the creek on this land is too wide for me to confidently jump across, as waterways go, it is fairly narrow. And yet, the fast-moving storm waters rolled down so hard over the creek bed that its solid contents had been thrown more than thirty feet out into the field next to it. So many rocks of all sizes and shapes, their many shades of white, yellow, orange, gray, brown, and red, glistening against a new carpet of sand, or newly buried under it. So many pieces of broken concrete and brick, and a basketball and a big black bucket lying on dry ground.

My cousin’s husband Hugh, who lives in a nearby county, said that the force of it was so strong that if we had been here during the storm, the sound from the rocks tumbling down the creek would have been resembled those of a bowling alley on a busy Saturday night.

The largest tree in the woods crashed down hard, right across the creek. Likely it had had been dead for a while. The tree snapped in two about 15 feet up from the ground; the part that fell broke into several pieces. We still need to borrow a chain saw to cut the part that still lies across the creek. What is left in the ground, mostly hollowed out, will give cover to birds and and other small animals.

Big chunks of soil washed into the creek. Where there had been more gradually sloped banks, there were now steep clay cliffs. This erosion was the worst of the storm damage here. Over the summer, even before the storm, the ground down near the creek felt a bit soggy underfoot; in some places there were cracks in the surface, it seemed to be breaking apart like ice floes/tundra. I worried that cutting the meadow back so close to the creek might have contributed to some instability.

Before the deluge, to begin stabilizing the banks, I planted two medium-sized native dogwood bushes (red twig dogwoods) near the creek and put small wire fences around them. I had meant to start some willows with tree cuttings from the woods side of the creek. With not enough time to plant them before we left for Australia, I put a few in water and several more in two pots with soil to start rooting them and left them up near the house.

Sometimes things work out better when you wait. If I had planted them right away, they would have totally washed away in the storm. The two dogwood bushes did survive. Their fences had been mangled and the plants were almost completely buried under mud and a wall of stone. The fences actually protected them to some degree and helped me see the bits of leaves and branches sticking out of the rubble, pointing me to the place to start excavating. They are a little worse for wear, but with some TLC, they will make it.

As I was pondering what else was needed to protect the creek banks, a “new member” letter arrived in my mailbox from the Haywood Waterway Association with helpful information. An enclosed brochure described the need for “riparian” buffers. Riparian refers to the land bordering a body of water. A riparian buffer is a vegetated strip that protects water quality by keeping the soil in the banks in place. Woody plants, trees and shrubs, with extensive root systems are needed. Exactly what I had been thinking about, even before Helene.

Now there was a name for it. I kind of think of it as a “repair-ian” buffer. I had been on the right track when I planned and finally did plant seven small willow trees and two white pine saplings (transplanted from the woods). I will spend the next year (at least) creating this buffer. Plants on the list I’m thinking of planting include: (more persimmon); pawpaw; elderberry; and (more) cardinal flowers. Not on the list, but of interest is river cane and (more) sochan.

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Everyone here during Helene and its aftermath has talked about how helpful everyone was, how people showed up with whatever they had to help people who needed it—a chainsaw, food, cleaning supplies, or even music. With so much conflict and polarization in our country these days, I wonder why humans seem to need a weather crisis to find their best selves. Why can’t they help anyone, everyone in need, regardless of the perceived reason for their challenges. And why can’t we seem to muster the discipline to act together to prevent a crisis.

And now?

It was very cold during this January visit. The weather was beautiful in our earlier November visit, though a lot of days were hotter than they should be at that time of year, evidence of the ensuing climate crisis. We all know Helene will not be the last storm we will need to weather, real or metaphorical. We need to plant the roots of human connection now to create the riparian buffer of community to keep us safe against the storm.

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With their hearts they turned to each other's hearts for refuge.

In the troubled years that came before the deluge.

Let creation reveal its secrets by and by, by and by.

(Jackson Browne)