carma

has it been a month already? sorry, y’all. it’s not really that there’s nothing interesting going on in wv, it’s just that i’m too lazy to actually write about it. maybe this will fix that.

my job is about 10 miles/20 minutes (gotta love those mountain miles) down the road from where i live, so naturally, one of the first observations i made about wv involved on-road encounters. i have a 1996 mazda 626—pretty small, as far as cars go (this picture, while not exactly helpful in showing dimensions, is what it looks like). at 14, the car doesn’t have a lot of pickup left, so while i can/do drive fast, it takes awhile to get to cruising speed. add to it the fact that, upon arrival, i wasn’t used to mountain roads, and i think you’ll see where i’m going.

point is, wv drivers HATED me. not only was i going ungodly slow, brakes squealing the whole way, but i have an nc license plate and a carolina sticker. just like all the north carolinians who yell, “come ON, south carolina!” whenever we come across one of our fair neighbors, west virginians don’t take too kindly to strangers poking along their country roads. for the first week, it was completely stressful—any time i got on the road, there was always some huge truck (ALWAYS with a wvu tag on the front), riding me. and often, passing me in some death-defying situation—it seemed usually to occur while going uphill, around a blind curve, and in a no-pass zone. no lie.

luckily, going the speed limit isn’t an issue anymore! i’ve gotten used to the curves here, and well, it’s way more fun than driving back home, even if the max speed is 60.

the great equalizer? tractors, logging trucks, semis, dump trucks—all similarly cringe-inducing. when you’re used to hitting the buckeye bend at 30 mph (google maps that for kicks), going about 7 mph feels like torture. some drivers are nice and pull their slow vehicles off where they can, others aren’t. either way, it’s just a fact of life that sooner or later you’re going to hit a tractor jam.

not sure what i’m really getting at here—i guess that for someone not used to driving one-lane/rural roads, it’s been an interesting introduction. also, a reminder: be nice to your fellow drivers! they’re probably as ticked off as you that someone’s riding a horse down the road.

photers: marlinton & environs

two posts in one day. miracle!

our new pup, vista! super cute, but she doesn't really slow down for pictures.

the drive to lewisburg, though perpetually nauseating, is also quite gorgeous.

lewisburg is the nearest large city, about an hour away. by large, i mean 10,000 people and a walmart. they have a pretty sweet downtown, though--it's really pretty and reminds me a bit of chapel hill.

i went to a reenactment of the battle of lewisburg the other week. interesting, uncomfortable, and really loud: that sums it up nicely.

this is the zaniness of west virginia in a nutshell: dude on the left brought a kitten to a battle reenactment.

A KITTEN. 

this doesn't even begin to cover what it's like here: the scenery is gorgeous and the people are insanely nice--but there's always things going on that give you pause. like the dog collar pro wrestling match in town this weekend. or when the grocery store ran out of tomatoes on memorial day. or the fact that when you order a baked potato at the greenbrier, you get two, covered in nacho cheese. or when i heard a dude blasting some of will smith's greatest hits while cruising through downtown. like i said, it's a nice place...but kind of strange.

photers: pearl buck

it's evident by now that i'm not good at this blogging thing--finally getting around to uploading photos, which should give a teeny look at what goes on at the pearl s. buck birthplace.

pearl s. buck's front yard!

my little corner of the house.

our collections records. no lie.

a time capsule. supposed to be buried in 1992, pretty sure it never saw the first speck of dirt.

we could really use uv filters on our windows.

win some, lose some

let's put it this way: we have an ungodly amount of books that look the same and haven't been accounted for in at least 10 years. on the bright side, it looks like we'll be having a japanese puppet show in october!

j.o.b.

seeing as this blog is 3 months old already, and i’ve been in west virginia for a couple of weeks now, it’s about time to tell you about my job—which is why i’m here in the first place. after all, why else would a body move to pocahontas county, population 9,000?

my official title is “americorps VISTA volunteer,” working at the “pearl s. buck birthplace,” which is a mouthful. a fancy way of saying “i’m getting paid a little to do a lot, and all in the middle of nowhere.” hope that doesn’t sound too complain-y, but let’s just call a spade a spade, shall we?

in the same vein, the pearl s. buck birthplace doesn’t exactly have a monopoly on her legacy. the fact of the matter is, pearl buck barely lived in this house at all. her parents, as many people know, were missionaries in china for near about 40 years. after several of their children died young, they returned home on furlough--whereupon pearl s. herself was born in her mother’s childhood home in hillsboro, west virginia (which is the aforenamed “birthplace,” of course—also known as ‘the stulting house,’ after her mother’s family). they returned to chinkiang (zhenjiang if you’re, you know, actually chinese) with the infant, returning only twice in the next twenty years. as a result, pearl buck probably only spent one year total in the house—not a lot of time.

however, the pearl s. buck birthplace isn’t completely without provenance—pearl buck wrote a book entitled My Mother’s House, essentially declaring her love for the hillsboro area and the stulting home—during the course of which, she says:

I hope it will live a new life, not for myself or for my family but for people. I would like it to belong to everyone who cares to go there. From that house there has come so much life that it ought never to die or fall into ruin. For my ancestors it provided shelter and home in a new land, a house where they lived their new lives with traditional dignity and ancient faith in the fine things of life, in beauty of art and music, in the value of education, in the necessity of integrity and goodness. For my mother it provided a home, living forever in her thought and memory, though she made dwelling places in a far country. For me it was a living heart in the country I knew was my own but which was strange to me until I returned to the house where I was born. For me that house was a gateway to America. May it live again, my mother's house, and may it prove for others, too, a gateway to new thoughts and dreams and ways of life! (p. 30-31)

boom. there you have it: the good people of pocahontas county took her at her word, the women’s clubs helped raise money to buy the ol’ homestead, and it became a house museum. since then, the organization’s gone through some twists and turns, and came out a little worse for wear. which is where i (along with the other VISTA volunteers we’ve had) come in. the museum board has a (very, very long and detailed) list of goals, which i’m supposed to help them accomplish. i have my own set of goals, and hopefully between the two, some kind of magic will happen.

so there you have it! a sufficiently vague description of my job duties. it’ll get clearer in the very near future, promise.

chair

this has absolutely nothing to do with west virginia--except for the fact that i'll be riding up the mountain with a very special chair in my possession. for the past few months, i've been reupholstering a chair...and it's about 95% finished! as soon as it's done (and it can't be finished TOO soon!), i'll have a lovely purple chair in which to sit in my brand new house!

this chair, as evidenced by these photos, had great lines but was in awful shape--completely watersoaked & mildewed. basically, something i wouldn't go near, much less sit on. (my dad, in all seriousness, gave me at least 10 lectures on how i needed to wash my hands after stripping the chair--which were COMPLETELY unneccesary. i'm a clean freak.)

innards.

bare bones.

my favorite part: tufting! i'd never gotten to try it before, but it was super easy and ended up looking really great. naturally, i neglected to take pictures of the results--but once i finish it all, you'll be able to see the finished product.

beads to hold the knots in...never realized how hard it is to take pictures one-handed with an slr! too heavy for those weak wrists.

by now, i've finished everything but the cushion--which is taking far too long! it's surprising how hard it's been, given the experience i have with sewing things. but i expect to be done in the next few days...after that, i hope not to see carpet tacks and batting for a very long time!

update: it's DONE! found a few pictures i forgot along the way.

house: found!

this spring has gone by really quickly; now there's less than a month left until i move to west virginia. i was getting pretty worried about where i'll be living, but today i got the good news--some of the other VISTAs and i got a house in marlinton!

another welcome surprise: it's actually really big, as well as adorable! i had been going into this blind, so i wasn't expecting much. but just check this beauty out!

on the inside, the pictures i've seen remind me of the house i grew up in--creaky-looking floors, a sloping roof, irregularly-sized windows, and tiny, nook-like bathrooms. oh, and a giant porch!

porch parties, anyone?

upstairs bedroom

the view from the dining room window

the location is really great--the house is in the largest town in pocahontas county (with a staggering population of 1,200). my job is in hillsboro, at the southern end of the county, but it's only about 15 minutes away. and snowshoe mountain is about 30 minutes away. so, while i might not have all the things i'm used to in north carolina, at least now i know that my house is great!

of course, i would feel awful if i kept this beautiful house all to myself...so for those of you who get the urge to come to lovely west virginia, please feel free to impose on me!

off for a celebratory house-having shopping trip! for some reason, i'm most excited about buying hand soap & cleaning products. strange...