View from the Mountain

Last Mowing Revisited

Eighteen years ago, I wrote a post, the Last Mowing.  We had been living in Roanoke, up on the mountain for fifteen years.  It was hard to get used to mowing the yard in December after years in New Brunswick where the snow could come in November and cover the ground until mid-May. 

Except for the green grass in December, there  were parts of living on the mountain that reminded us of our years in Canada.  The sometimes snowy weather was one thing and the friendly people were the other.

When you come over our hill after dark, it is almost like an approach to the airport. The city is spread out before you, street lights blinking, and buildings glowing. There are not many views in the world that can compete with it.

Being on top of the world at the end of the road seems to make us closer. Perhaps we have been drawn closer by the few times that the county has forgotten to plow the snow off the road in the winter.

Flatlanders, that is anyone who does not live on the hill, often ask how we get up the hill in the winter. Actually getting up the hill has rarely been the problem. All of us at the top have at least one four wheel drive. It takes less than one winter to realize that going down the hill is far more exciting than going up. I have been fortunate to have a job that allows me to work at home when necessary. That means that snowy morning’s entertainment usually is watching the folks who have to go to work try to get down the hill safely.

Our  first year on the mountain, we got an early coat of ice.  Everyone on the hill banded together and we cut a single tire track all the way to the bottom of the hill.  It was the first of many weather adventures on the hill.  We saw snow storms that were worthy of Canada.

It was a good place to live  and while we lived there, those of us at the top of the hill were a tight-knit group.  and I remember more parties than disagreements.  After we moved from the hill,  most friends drifted away but we remain close to one family that grew up with our children.

A lot of water has passed under me in skiff and kayak in the fifteen years after we moved from Roanoke and lived on North Carolina’s Crystal Coast.  My crocs also covered many miles of sandy beach. Yet I still fondly remember the years when we partied on our decks whenever given the slightest chance. There was no close neighborhood group in our coastal subdivision. I will blame it on the lack of any steep hills.

After fifteen years in the marsh, we moved from the coast during the pandemic.  Selling, buying, and moving during a pandemic are not the easiest things to do, but with lots of help, we managed to find a nice neighborhood less than half an hour from where I grew up in North Carolina’s Piedmont. We even found a home with a real backyard instead of a marsh or a ravine.

While my family has deep roots here, many who have been close to us are much older even than us.  The younger generation has their own busy lives and there is little to connect us with the neighborhood. Last year none of our immediate neighbors even attended the annual neighborhood HOA picnic with free (well it is covered by your dues) barbecue.

When we lived at the coast, we had a wonderful church family but we lost that when we moved.  Because of the pandemic, we remain video-church goers.  If the pandemic recedes further, perhaps we will find another church family.

Age, changes due to the way people live, some driven by the pandemic and even political divisions make it harder to connect.

Much like it was in early December eighteen years ago in Roanoke, we just had our last mowing of the yard here in North Carolina’s Piedmont hill country. Our fescue yard is still green like our bluegrass one in Roanoke so there is a chance it will be mowed again.

Our yards might be much the same green in December but somehow it feels like our world has changed.   In is unlikely we will have as close a group of friends as we did in Roanoke both on the hill and in the flatlands. Having children in school makes it easy to have common ground.  The Roanoke friends will have to share a spot in our fond memories of the friends we made during our years on the farm and in Halifax, Nova Scotia.

I have always believed that  there are good people everywhere, you just have to work harder in some places to find them than others.  I have seen nothing to change my mind in our latest move. We are finding our new ones, one at a time.

The Quietest New Year

We lived in Carteret County, North Carolina, for over sixteen years.

My Northern Virginia son believed that we lived somewhere beyond the edge of civilization. It is true that our former home is surrounded on the north and east sides by the 160,000 acres of long leaf pines and swamps contained in the Croatan National Forest.  

On the southern side there is the Atlantic Ocean with 76 miles of shoreline but only 20 miles of it developed in low density housing which precludes huge year round crowds. Then there was the two-miles wide White Oak River flanking us to the west with the 156,000 acres of Camp Lejeune and the Marines holding down that flank.  

You drive on two lane roads through a lot of farmland and forest to get to our former house. Often the first question out of a first time visitor's mouth was, "Just how did you find this place?"  The answer of course is that Carteret County is organized around waterways not roads. You find a place by exploring the waterways not following roads.

While it was not like living in a noisy metro area with continual blaring sirens and the near constant hum of traffic, it certainly was not a quiet rural place to live like our home in a small subdivision in yet-to-be-developed Davie County, North Carolina.

First off the Camp Lejeune Marines are not quiet neighbors. I have no disagreement that the jets, helicopters, mortars, and even bunker busters add up to the sound of freedom, but individually and collectively they are still very noisy and often made our windows rattle.

Then there is the minor thing about living in a vacation destination. Apparently going on vacation means you can ignore all rules including noise regulations.  The problem is compounded by a fair number of people who come for  beach vacations and either never leave or come back to put down roots.  They become permanent residents without ever losing their vacation attitude of being beyond the noise rules.

This the-rules-don't-mean-me attitude often means that even during dry times, fireworks can happen at any time just like mortars or bombing practice which is announced irregularly with just enough warning to confuse everyone.  Where we lived there was even a guy who thought firing off a small but exceedingly noisy canon was a good thing to do randomly just before bedtime for the neighborhood kids.

Even the White Oak River which was almost deserted when we first moved to the area in 2006 eventually got its share of boats and jet skis. The only safe place on a holiday in the summer was sitting on the barely covered oyster rocks in the middle of the river.

However none of the means that Carteret County was anything but a true natural paradise with added noise. Residents, including those with feathers and fur adjusted to the noise whether from bombing runs, impromptu fireworks, noisy jet skis or random homemade canons.

Still our move in 2021 has proved that there are quieter places than the edge of the earth natural paradise of Carteret County. 

Downtown Mocksville was quieter than quiet on New Year's Day. In our subdivision instead of fireworks starting two or three days before New Year's and peaking on New Year's Eve with a gradual leveling off the first week of January, we have heard none.  We have not even heard a single Christmas drone much less a Marine fighter jet or Osprey. There hasn't even been a single late night, low-flying helicopter.

Aside from one noisy jacked-up white truck that drives up and down a nearby local road, we have settled into a very peaceful spot.  It is no surprise that I don't miss the noisy canon or its owner at all.

After a year like 2021, quiet is good and would be even better if about half a dozen crazy politicians would lose their voices.