Life lessons from mud and mountains

One of the many reasons I love what I do at Grow Appalachia is that I get to travel around quite a bit.  Granted, winter is right at our doorstep, which in terms of the growing season means that virtually all activity essentially comes to a screeching halt.  However, when the opportunity for travel does come around, it is greatly welcomed and look forward to, partly because of the break in pace, and mostly because it is usually somewhere I have never ventured to before.  This week was no exception.  

I am less than 24 hours from returning to our most recent excursion, a very small and very rural high school in Floyd County, Kentucky, in an old coal town of David.  By very small, I mean 27 students attend this school; no, not 27 in a homeroom class, I mean 27 as in total enrollment, and by very rural, I mean surrounded by mountains, literally surrounded.  Now, I'm a lifelong resident of Appalachia, so I'm no stranger to mountains and rural...but this was definitely more than I've seen.  

Like I said, surrounded.  But do you SEE just how beautiful?? 

We pulled up and the first thing I said was "Where are we?"  After a few minutes of wandering the grounds and meeting up with our point people, I decided I would not mind living there.  The pictures really do not do it justice...no noise, no distractions, just pure, unfiltered natural beauty and mountains as far as the eye can see.  Give me this over a big city any day of the week!  In addition, I felt an overwhelming sense of peace.  It's really difficult to describe...being in nature sometimes helps me feel closer to God, and our society is so driven by technology and commuting and constant interactions.  Being "unplugged" was refreshing, simply put.  

The principal and the teachers at the school (who were all just beyond awesome) had put together a schedule to help us build the high tunnel, and of course they were all just so excited!  I love that, by the way:  I know when I was in high school I would never be excited about something like this.  Just being honest here.  Their enthusiasm makes me more enthusiastic too!  Anyway, we set up shop late morning and immediately had a few students hammering in posts and pitching in.  The major downside of this though, WAS THE MUD!!!  The grounds looked like a swamp!  It was lightly raining when we arrived, but we powered through it, but by lunchtime it had steadily picked up and appeared it wasn't going anywhere.  Unfortunately, our first day's work had to come to a stop; the students were pretty disappointed, but you know, that's life; sometimes things don't work out they way as planned.  I think it was a valuable life lesson for them.  Heck, I still need a refresher every now and then.  We got a good bit done yesterday, in even MORE mud.  Seriously, there was so much mud we were losing shoes and pants were borderline ruined and the poor baseboards were nicely splattered when finished.  But here's life lesson number 2: good, useful things take time.  It's not a "push a button and bam here you go" process.  One of the many reasons I love going on builds (and why I'm thankful I even get to do so) is that those who help us get to see their work in progress.  They get to see the progression of the work, and there's a great sense of pride in that.  The unique part of this school is that these students have a variety of things in common: they've fallen behind in public school, they have god-awful home situations, they've been bullied, and the list goes on.  The rapport among them was extraordinary.  My boss is so great with students because he lets them in on as much of the process as possible; he believes in building their confidence because so often, students are so used to hearing "No you can't", or "You're not smart enough".  It goes beyond all parameters of heart-warming and inspiring.  I truly love and respect the people I work with and I'm grateful for these opportunities.  

I'll save the rest of the story for the official work blog, mostly because I'm writing this while I'm on my lunch break and I have about 15 minutes left before I need to head back to the office,  I wrote on my Twitter not too long ago that I think I left part of me in the mountains, because I miss the quiet.  I'm reflecting on these life lessons, and the sheer awe of those all-around mountains.  Honestly, it's probably going to take a couple of days to get reoriented.  I was laying in bed last night and I just kept thinking "It's too loud here."  ALL of this to say is that I'm glad we didn't finish our tunnel, because that just means we get to go back soon; back to the students and their confidence, back to the pride in good work, back to hopefully less mud, and back to those mountains.