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14 september 2000

on homesickness

No matter where I've lived throughout my young adulthood, I continue to call North Carolina home. It's one of those things I do to keep my head on straight, to remind me that I belong to a place in spite of where life takes me. Over the past couple of years, I've begun to regard homesickness as a gift, as bittersweet as it can sometimes feel. When things get difficult, knowing that I always have a place to go keeps me grounded. Hearing its sound made me happy.

Aside from spending years with a NC license plate hanging from my wall or prominently displayed on a shelf, I've soothed my homesickness with familiar music. Throughout high school, I was never one to listen to what was terribly popular. Rather, I developed an odd affinity for folk music of all kinds, both contemporary and traditional. In particular, I love acoustic singer/songwriters. From Janis Ian, to Joni Mitchell, to James Taylor, to Simon and Garfunkel --- these were the people who made being me a little more tolerable. They sang poetry, they played gently, and provided me with a few history lessons along the way. While I certainly didn't own the coolest tape collection in my high school, I think I definitely owned the most life-affirming.

Without a doubt, however, my favorite guy to this day is David Wilcox. He's a Midwesterner by birth, having been raised in Akron, Ohio; and taught himself how to play guitar late in high school. When the time came to choose a college, he ended up at Warren Wilson, a tiny liberal arts school in Swannanoa, NC. Poetry is a big deal there. It's a good place to find your voice, and happened to be about three miles from my high school.

So there also used to be a little place on Cherry Street in Black Mountain called McDibb's. It was an unassuming little club, established long before the mountains became "the" place to live for artists, retirees, and infatuated tourists. When I was a teenager, it was one of the only places I could go. There was a bar, but it wasn't the sort of place that invited trouble. So there was always a good mix of young and young-at-heart people who just wanted to kick back and hear some good music.

Sadly, McDibb's closed several years ago.

In its heyday, however, there was no better place for a kid with limited pocket money and gentle taste in music. I could stroll down there on any given weeknight and hear the best stuff. Like, did you know that James Taylor has a brother named Livingston? He used to play McDibb's all the time, with real Carolina-inspired music. As did David Wilcox. At the time, he wasn't nearly as popular as he is now. In fact, I remember many a Tuesday night when I could drop two or three dollars and listen to this tall, skinny guy sing with more love for life than I'd ever heard. He has his bluesy tunes, too, but for the most part, he just doesn't compain too much. To hear him tell it, life is a pretty decent place to be in spite of what it throws at you. And Carolina is the best place to be. Comfortable for poets, those mountains grow their own music.

So as I returned to Carolina this time around, I found that there was no need for a road map.

I placed my ear to the ground and found my way back.