“And the least that those who are fortunate enough to be dwellers of the French Broad country can do, out of humble thankfulness for nature’s bounty to them, is make certain that their town, their city and their industries around them at last shoulder their responsibility.” — Wilma Dykeman,The French Broad An abundance of water […]
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Eco shorts
It’s not just some romantic fancy that leads us to classify these environmental-news briefs by the four ancient elements: Earth, Water, Air and Fire. Modern physicists say four states of matter exist — solid, liquid, gas and plasma and four layers of the planet (geosphere, hydrosphere, atmosphere and magnetosphere). Whatever terms you use, that’s four […]
Asheville City Council
The Asheville City Council’s April 9 formal session seemed more a harbinger of things to come than an event in itself. Two changes to the Unified Development Ordinance gave hints that the current Council might be more favorably inclined toward a pair of controversial proposed developments due to come before Council soon. And the appointments […]
Carving up votes
If the Republicans who filed suit over legislative redistricting win their case in the North Carolina Supreme Court, the people of our state will be the losers. If the lawsuit is successful: • Legislative campaigns will become more costly — and more dependent on TV ads. • The clout of big money, special interests and […]
Ready to believe
Just like people, music has a soul. It’s what makes us enjoy what we hear. And some of us can take this simple theory and make a life out of it. What began as an adventure for six young men in Athens, Ga., known as Widespread Panic has become a way of life for legions […]
The Practical Gardener
An estimated 9 million to 10 million people were living in the Americas when Europeans arrived; corn was found growing everywhere. Columbus recorded seeing a corn field that stretched 18 miles. Many records from early scouting expeditions in Latin America and the Middle Atlantic states tell of marching past corn fields for days along broad, […]
Spirit, stone and Martian greeting customs
What are you in praise of? Not what are you merely grateful for — but what makes you want to jump around, dance and sing, ecstatic simply to be alive, joyful to be nowhere else but exactly where you? And, more importantly, how often do you even stop to notice those things? The Liz Lerman […]
Party politics
They’d probably object to the implication of patriotism; nonetheless, Oakland-based hip-hop band The Coup can best be described as an American success story. What could be more American than freedom of speech? Bandleader Raymond “Boots” Riley has talent to match his convictions. He’s a songwriter, rapper, programmer, producer — and a man whose active political […]
The great cosmic chuckle
Author/counselor/spiritual renegade Karuna Alan Kistler has blazed a unique path combining psychotherapy, spiritual guidance and a fierce commitment to honoring each individual’s inner truth. His next book, Driving Your Demons Sane Before They Drive You Crazy: Healing the Hell of Inner Abuse is due out this summer. Here he discusses his most recent book, Holy […]
The latest word
“Poems are made by fools like me, but only God can make a tree.” — Joyce Kilmer April is National Poetry Month, and Asheville has long been known for its support of poets and their work. It would, of course, be impossible in such a limited space to recognize all the local bards. Poets bring […]
The Practical Gardener
We should be having epiphanies every day. Trouble is, we’re creatures of habit, and epiphanies just don’t tend to unfold within the realm of ordinary consciousness. All day long, we’re dealing with stresses at work and in traffic and remembering to make creative bag lunches for the kids. So it’s a relief to be able […]
The Wild Gardener
For years, gardeners have loved the purple coneflower (Echinacea purpurea). These stalwart plants have decorated borders, flowerbeds and wildflower collections for so long it’s easy to forget they’re native Americans. Their range covers a lot of territory in the Midwest, the east-central United States, and locally in Burke, Jackson, Mecklenburg, Polk and Rutherford counties. In […]
Outside the box
introduction by Tracy Rose Like a souped-up sugar cube, the hulking white Wachovia Building dominates the triangle surrounding downtown Asheville’s Pritchard Park. So when the possibility arose that the enormous blockish building might come on the market, we at Xpress began spinning grand scenarios about its future. Thanks to last fall’s merger of First Union […]
Asheville City Council
On March 26, the Asheville City Council held a public hearing to discuss the future of the Civic Center — in less than an hour. City leaders listened to the public, displayed a remarkable grasp of the complicated issues surrounding the multimillion-dollar proposal, and staked out positions that reflected a genuine concern for the community, […]
Notepad
“Buy local” food campaign chosen for national initiative It was nearly a year-and-a-half ago that Mountain Partners in Agriculture (a community-based collaborative working to develop sustainable farming and food systems) publicly launched its “Get Fresh, Buy Appalachian” campaign, aimed at encouraging WNC consumers to buy locally grown food. The campaign, part of the organization’s Appalachian […]
United they stand
North Carolina is broke. In case you haven’t heard, the state is facing a deficit of nearly $1 billion. To stem the rising red tide, Gov. Mike Easley has declared a state of fiscal emergency and has withheld more than $200 million, all told, in scheduled payments to cities and counties around the Tar Heel […]
Yucca Mountain nuclear-waste site spells trouble for WNC
Interstate 65 south of Nashville was shut down for several hours on March 15 after a tractor-trailer overturned. According to the Tennessee Highway Patrol, a double tractor-trailer carrying radioactive medical waste hit a bridge and guard rail before overturning next to I-65, resulting in a radioactive-waste spill. Emergency-management personnel reported that the load contained low-level […]
History in the making
Far from being just an entertaining diversion, “storytelling,” insists Peninnah Schram, “is the most human activity we do.” Schram became an award-winning professional storyteller as an adult, but she’s been telling stories since childhood, when she learned the craft from her parents. “As a child, I listened to my parents telling me stories, and I […]
Point blank
David Craig Starkey, artistic director of the Asheville Lyric Opera, admits that the historical Annie Oakley was probably much simpler and less glamorous than her stage portrayal — but since Annie Get Your Gun was written for Ethel Merman, the role is forever imbued with that actress’s flamboyant presence. Although the musical is loosely based […]
The Practical Gardener
I was out in the greenhouse recently, watering and thinning salad greens. I was also kicking myself for my springtime dereliction of duty. I’d had a fine crop of greens going: kale, arugula, lettuce, spinach and turnip tops, all in the advanced-seedling stage. They had been growing like gangbusters under a second layer of floating […]
Re-wiring the rules
What is groosion? “It’s, of course, a combination of groove and fusion,” says drummer Robin Tolleson, who’s also a well-seasoned music journalist. OK, maybe a better question is: Why groosion? “Somewhere along the way,” Tolleson feels, “fusion got a bad connotation. It went commercial sort of, trying to sell records. For us, groove and fusion […]