This past weekend, 70 fellow church members and I left families, quotidian cares, and schedules behind as we focused on friendship in the shady hills of Western North Carolina, at our biannual women’s retreat.
Just six months ago, we wouldn’t have been able to meet at our cherished retreat site. The YMCA Blue Ridge Assembly in Black Mountain, N.C., near Asheville, only reopened in June at 40% capacity. Hurricane Helene washed away nearly every road while floodwaters tore through buildings and left behind silt and muck through most of the structures built in the early 1900s.
In September 2024, the cafeteria was filled with water hip-high. This weekend, we ate in that room while spotting bears climbing trees through the plate-glass windows. Today, most roads still have detours, and all the hiking trails are still washed out.
The national spotlight has turned away from Western North Carolina, but rebuilding continues, quietly and surely. New additions to the 120-year-old Assembly campus included Caterpillar bulldozers and trucks. Though two historic buildings are closed for all of 2025 while restoration continues, new groups of youth leaders and adults are visiting the mountain.
At the retreat, I roomed with someone who was in Black Mountain during Helene. “Living in Black Mountain — it was like being on the front doorstep of Heaven,” Genie Sullivan, a former Black Mountain resident, said of the close bonds the community shared. During Helene and the aftermath, everyone pulled together. “It didn’t matter if you were black or white; everyone pitched in.”
The residents loved all those who came from across the nation to help. “The people who came were miraculous,” Genie said. “Some people came all the way from California to help. Once those Genie called the “big hitters” — the engineers and military came in, “the people who could leave did, because this town wasn’t big enough to support all those people.”
The effects linger on. “A few months later, after another storm, our minister prayed for all the people who were scared by that storm, who had bad memories (brought back),” Genie said. “My house didn’t get any damage, but I can say that PTSD is real – I can vouch for that.”
As I left the retreat, I passed through Swannanoa, a small, unincorporated area five miles from Black Mountain. This community along the banks of the Swannanoa River had been almost completely washed away. Exactly one hundred years after the first houses of the Beacon Mill Village went up, the floodwaters of Hurricane Helene submerged homes up to their roofs. Only 11of the 77 houses in the lower village were livable. The rest were standing, but after tons of sludge were removed, the houses had to be stripped to the studs and framing, left to dry out.
Last month, the 10th family was ready to move back in. Renovations are still going on. One homeowner tagged the home wrap on his house’s unclad exterior with “Through the mud we rise.” Many houses being rebuilt have signs out front, proclaiming the different sponsors caring for the family, or a volunteer group like the Mennonites helping to rebuild.
The community is coming together. The non-profit FANS — Friends and Neighbors of Swannanoa — maintains lists of locations offering free dinners, supplies, immunizations, even showers and laundry services. Blunt Pretzels and Kitchen offers a free community meal every Monday from 4 to 6 p.m. for anyone who needs it. There are even plans for a “Bluntsgiving Gathering” on Thanksgiving Day.
Too often in our sub-24-hour news cycle, disaster news moves at the speed of social media, then flickers out of the collective consciousness as we flip to the next reel. Families across the nation, not just in Western North Carolina, are still putting their lives back together. Lahaina, the L.A. fires, and other tragedies recede in our memories. My trip this past weekend taught me that Americans everywhere are still hurting. They still need our help.
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