Well, here we are. At the end. This book has been tough to write. I've been ragged with decisions and hesitations. When I first decided to write this book, I had no idea the emotional impact it would have on me. Now that I'm writing the end, I wonder, Did I tell too much? What will this information be put to use for truly? Have I made a mistake and forsaken something? These questions have racked my skull from one end of Tennessee to the other.
My hope is that I have done my best to organize this book in a way to introduce you to this folk practice for you, as layfolk, to effectively put the roots of this land to use. I've led you through the culture, through stories of the hills and my own family, and down paths of superstition, through the graveyards and churches. We've dug our feet into the dirt, and spoke with the Unseen.
For so long this practice has been clutched to my chest, with the memories of my grandfathers and grandmothers, stuck on autumn pumpkin pies and summer fishing trips. Appalachian folks are sentimental, close-knit, resourceful people. We don't shun outsiders, but we also won't tear down the fence between us and them. In writing this book, I'm giving something up that is tied to my bones. I bared my blood and soul to write these pages. I've sat at the altar to my ancestors in silence, wondering what they would do. I've sat in the rain and dug my toes into the red clay dirt, asking if sharing this was the right thing to do.
Writing this book brought me back to childhood memories that at first seemed to have no connection to this work, but on further reflection are a critical part of it. When I was five years old, I tripped getting onto the back porch of my great-grandfather's house while carrying a mason jar of caterpillars. The jar shattered and my knees were cut up, but Mamaw Margie patched me up with some peroxide and bandages. No folk remedies or anything. Another time, when I was about the same age, Mama and Daddy took us down to Pigeon Forge for the weekend, where we stayed in a cheap motel with an indoor pool. We had so much fun, and it's one of the only good memories when the whole family was happy. I guess we were, but I was too young to tell otherwise—and I don't care to learn otherwise.
The clearest memory of my Papaw Trivett was when we arrived one day and he was sitting on the couch and right away said, “There's my Peanut!” His funeral was the only time I've seen my Nana cry (aside from allergies) while they did the twenty-one-gun salute.
I also remembered again and again the times my Mamaw Hopson would make biscuits for an army, intended for just my sister and me. I remembered so much, I went in the kitchen and worked dough just to remember more through the scent and feel of flour everywhere and the dough sticking to my hands. I even went to a store and stood in front of the wind chimes, thinking about how many she kept on the porch and in the kitchen's floor-to-ceiling window that looked out to the barn and the bridge that covered the creek.
None of these things had anything to do with roots, charms, or cures. I don't know who or what, but something pulled me down those memory lanes and kept pulling me until I learned how it was connected. All those childhood memories had nothing to do with this, yet they represent everything held in this practice. I wasn't remembering cures and charms or techniques for a reason: they weren't everything. I was reminded about the love and soul of my family, the blood that binds us and takes us back in time. I was reminded of my family's utmost faith in God and the strength that gave them in their bones.
There's a unified spirit to this practice that I can't identify as anything else other than Appalachia. A song by Jeff Brown & Still Lonesome called “Appalachia Is My Name” sums this up well. Appalachia is much more than sweet tea, gentle grannies, and fresh apple pies. There are criminals who will show their teeth at you to get what they want. Trust me, that ain't a smile. And there are folks so caught up in their drug addiction that no amount of prayer could keep them from the grave.
Many people do what they can to survive. Even that statement doesn't cover the woes some of us go through. There have been times the fridge was bone-dry because we needed to sell the food stamps to help make rent or keep the power on. Lots of us can't afford to pay for health insurance or to go to the doctor for a potential emergency. These mountains give us strength, but they can also turn you lonesome and mad. I can see why some turn to the bottle.
These mountains can bring you to salvation or walk you to death in the dark. There's a lot of bad blood in these hills. It hollers amen in the church, sits at the kitchen table talking about what so and so did, and swims inside the bottle of 'shine. Paired with the struggle, it is the magic and medicine that has kept us up and going. The church is a steady hand in a lot of this work. Even though many people in Appalachia aren't churchgoing folk, they still have their faith, which is evident in almost every formula. As Nana always said, “You can get saved talking to God while sitting on the john just the same as you could at the altar.”
We have our own way of faith, food, dress, music, and magic. We have our own lands and hills and trails . . . and it's all ours, all that we can see. We may not be proud of some things, but that doesn't mean we'll divorce it. From our struggles and problems to our faith and culture, this is Appalachia. We are Appalachia.
This culture relied on folk magic and medicine for centuries, when nary a doctor or preacher could be found. It lifted and placed curses, healed wounds inside and out, gave faith and hope to people, and, most importantly, endured. But this tradition is at a crossroads: live on or pass on. Either this work continues and lives, or it gets forgotten and breaks down more over time with each passing generation until the heirs of Appalachia have never seen the magic and faith of their forefolks.
This is poor man's work: tins cans, wading in the creeks, plugging trees, and plowing the fields. It demands you work and sacrifice blood and sweat until you're bone-tired for it. Didn't you hear? Faith without works is dead. I have faith that this work will continue, respected and honored, inside and outside of Appalachia. I may come from a broken home, bad blood, and poverty; I may never go to college, own my own big home, or travel the world; but I will have these mountains to hold my spirit, support my feet when they're old and stumbling, and make a bed for me when I give up the ghost.
When everything's said and done, I'll still be here drying cobs in the sun, gathering herbs in the woods, and moss from the creeks with that rabbit's foot in my pocket; I'll be there bartering with farmers for milk and wool and hair. I think the most important thing for any tradition to truly live on in its culture of birth is to have honest folks to represent it and pass it on. Some things will follow me to the grave. Times are changing, and a lot of this tradition's purposes and needs are fading from society as Appalachia outgrows its “primitive” and “redneck” ways.
Amidst this progression, I will be here in the backwoods when needed and sought, curing with silver and boiled milk, speaking to unseen guests, and spelling folks' history through dead man's eyes until the day I die. The things I'll take to the grave with me? Well, they're better left between the Devil and me, whispered only from my grave to those with the gift, heart, and spirit to hold it.