In the immediate aftermath of Tropical Storm Helene, local professional photographers and videographers took to the streets to document the wreckage. In the weeks and months that followed, they also captured the region’s resiliency and efforts at recovery.
Recaps
Featuring images by Sarah Jones Decker and Patrick Bresnan
Scott Southwick
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PUBLISHER & EDITOR: Jeff Fobes
ASSISTANT PUBLISHER: Susan Hutchinson
MANAGING EDITOR: Thomas Calder
EDITORS: Lisa Allen, Gina Smith
OPINION EDITOR: Tracy Rose
STAFF REPORTERS:
Lisa Allen, Thomas Calder, Brionna Dallara, Justin McGuire, Greg Parlier, Brooke Randle, Gina Smith
COMMUNITY CALENDAR & CLUBLAND: Braulio Pescador-Martinez
CONTRIBUTING EDITORS: Jon Elliston, Mindi Meltz Friedwald, Peter Gregutt, Rob Mikulak
REGULAR CONTRIBUTORS:
Christopher Arbor, Edwin Arnaudin, Mark Barrett, Eric Brown, Carmela Caruso, Cayla Clark, Tessa Fontaine, Mindi Meltz Friedwald, Carol Kaufman, Bill Kopp, Chasity Leake, Jessica Wakeman, Kay West, Clark Wilson, Jamie Zane
PHOTOGRAPHERS: Cindy Kunst
ADVERTISING, ART & DESIGN MANAGER: Susan Hutchinson
LEAD DESIGNER: Scott Southwick
GRAPHIC DESIGNERS: Tina Gaafary, Caleb Johnson, Olivia Urban
MARKETING ASSOCIATES: Emily Baughman, Sara Brecht
INFORMATION TECHNOLOGIES: Hinton Edgerton, Jeff Fobes, Mark Murphy, Scott Southwick
WEB: Brandon Tilley
BOOKKEEPER: Amie Fowler
OFFICE MANAGER: Mark Murphy
ADMINISTRATION & BILLING: Hinton Edgerton, Lisa Watters
DISTRIBUTION: Susan Hutchinson, Cindy Kunst
DISTRIBUTION DRIVERS: Ashley Alms, Cass Kunst, Henry Mitchell, Courtney Israel Nash, Joey Nash, Carl & Debbie Schweiger, Gary
Noah Tanner, Mark Woodyard
Poetry Contest
Xpress announces its 2025 poetry contest in celebration of April as National Poetry Month.
Are you a poet living in Western North Carolina? If so, consider submitting an original, previously unpublished work. This year’s theme is on life in Western North Carolina after Tropical Storm Helene. What are the visuals from the storm’s immediate aftermath that stick with you? What acts of kindness left an impression? How did you get through it? How has the ongoing recovery process impacted you or your loved ones? What gives you hope for our region? Of course, these questions are just suggestions. Your poem might address an entirely separate aspect of the storm. Trust your instinct and submit your most polished work.
All poems should be no longer than one typed page in a 12-point font. (Any poems that go beyond the page count will be disqualified.) Again, only previously unpublished poems will be considered. No A.I. generated poems are allowed. And while we love to hear from our younger poets, we ask children under 18 to submit their work to our annual Kids Issues.
The contest is currently open for submissions and will close at 11:59 p.m. on Wednesday, March 12. Email your poem in the body of the message to tcalder@mountainx.com Embedded links or attached documents will not be read. The subject line should read “Xpress 2025 Poetry Contest.” Include the author’s name and contact information in the email. Only one submission per person. There is no cost to enter.
A winning poem will be determined by local poet Michal Dechane, author of the collection The Long Invisible. The winner will be published online and in print in our April 30 issue. The contest is not open to Xpress employees or their families, or freelance contributors.
Contact Thomas Calder at tcalder@mountainx.com with any questions
Neighborhood woods can’t be destroyed
[Regarding “Tree Defenders: Five Points Residents Rally to Preserve Wooded Area Owned by UNCA,” Feb. 5, Xpress:]
Thank you for bringing this to what I hope is a lot more folks’ attention. With so many of Western North Carolina’s hiking trails ruined in Asheville by Hurricane Helene, we just can’t destroy the Five Points Woods!
— Beth McAlister Alexander
Save UNCA’s woods
[Regarding “Tree Defenders: Five Points Residents Rally to Preserve Wooded Area Owned by UNCA,” Feb. 5, Xpress:]
My daughter lives in the Five Points neighborhood. She made many good friends walking in the woods. This neighborhood loves to go to the woods to see each other, walk their dogs and visit the live animals that live in the woods. The birds (including owls), bunnies and other wildlife, even the bears, come there.
This spot holds the community together. With no parks nearby, this is the best area. In addition, the storm took down so many trees that I do not think we should take down any more.
— Pat Pritchitt Weaverville
Ask governor to preserve woods
[Regarding “Tree Defenders: Five Points Residents Rally to Preserve
Wooded Area Owned by UNCA,” Feb. 5, Xpress:]
Did the hurricane not do enough damage to Asheville and Western North Carolina? Now some UNC Asheville group wants to destroy even more precious forest and woodlands fortunate enough to survive.
Is the forest, woods, a few open meadows with walkways providing places of enjoyment for people and habitat for wildlife no longer allowed so some developer can make millions?
UNCA is public and technically belongs to the people of North Carolina, not to the UNC board or senior officers. Contact the governor! He cares about people and providing necessary needs, plus improving lifestyles for North Carolina citizens.
— Lenard King Greenville, S.C.
Great idea: harvesting downed trees
[Regarding “Team Timber: One Community’s Quest to Manage Its Downed Trees, Post-Helene,” Jan. 22, Xpress, as featured in Xpress’ Jan. 29 newsletter:] My partner and I own and live on a 4-acre property in Flat Rock. We live much closer to Saluda, above the Green River. We lost 17 trees that were topped or that fell. I would love to donate them to a lumber company. Insurance paid for us to remove one of the trees.
There are many other trees down on neighboring properties, and I would be happy to survey neighbors to see if they would mind donating the lumber in exchange for removal. I absolutely love the idea of harvesting the wood instead of having it decay over time or burned up in a pile.
Thanks for the newsletter with the suggestion of such a great idea!
— Angie Davis Flat Rock X
Word
of the week
bokeh (n.)
the blurred quality or effect seen in the out-of-focus portion of a photograph taken with a narrow depth of field
Given that this week’s cover story is about photography, we figured we’d find a related word. X
CARTOON BY RANDY MOLTON
CARTOON BY BRENT BROWN
Finding their voice
Siblings discuss demonstrations against Trump’s immigration orders
YOUNG AND ORGANIZED: Siblings Victor, left, and Karen Perez organized a pair of recent demonstrations in downtown Asheville opposing an immigration crackdown. The young organizers are both in high school and say they have plans for future events. Photo by Caleb Johnson
BY SAMUEL CALEB JOHNSON
cjohnson@mountainx.com
On Feb. 3, residents took to the streets of downtown Asheville for the first of two major demonstrations in response to President Donald Trump’s executive orders on immigration. The event culminated in a block party that spilled onto Interstate 240 as souped-up cars revved in celebration of Mexican heritage.
Initially, participants did not know who organized the gathering. Some heard about it on Instagram. Others received emails. Ultimately, siblings Karen and Victor Perez, 15 and 18, respectively, stepped forward. The two went on to organize the subsequent Feb. 8 rally. Both gatherings drew hundreds of participants and spanned multiple hours.
Xpress recently caught up with the siblings about their efforts. Along with the recent protests, they have launched an Instagram account,
@immigrationsalertasheville, which has over 1,000 followers.
“We’ve definitely gotten busier this week,” says Karen, who, like her brother, is juggling the demands of high school and a part-time job in addition to their activism.
This interview has been edited for brevity and clarity.
Xpress: Some readers may be surprised to hear that people so young can pull this off. How do you reflect on your age as it pertains to organizing?
Karen: Growing up, we always wanted to do something like this. Being so young puts us out there with other people our age. We saw so many people from our school at our first protest, and we didn’t expect that turnout. We would’ve been ecstatic with just 40 people.
Victor: Being young gives you a lot of opportunities. You might have a job, but it’s typically part-time, so you have some free time to focus on
extracurricular activities. Our age has allowed us to reach for things we couldn’t otherwise. I don’t feel limited by it. Gen Z is very empowered — we like to speak our minds, and our age is a helpful tool.
What does being Hispanic mean to you, and how has it shaped your perspective on life?
Karen: Being Hispanic means loving everyone around you, regardless of ethnicity. It’s about learning how to share — we love our culture so much. That’s why we decided to do this: to show people the importance of our community and our humanity.
Victor: Being Hispanic is definitely about family. There’s a stereotype that Mexicans, especially, have big families. While that may be true sometimes, what’s definitely true is that those families love each other. Within the family there are so many connections. We watch each other’s backs and are always there for one another. That has been our inspi-
ration for these protests — we want to speak up for families that can’t speak up for themselves.
What is your relationship like with the City of Asheville and the Asheville Police Department?
Victor: We didn’t ask the city for anything because we didn’t expect that kind of turnout. People were scared when the police showed up, but it made sense [that they did] — they were there to keep us safe and to keep traffic flowing. There were so many people that the sidewalk couldn’t contain them all. I appreciate them for coming out and closing the roads.
For our second event, we contacted [the city]. We felt called out when WLOS wrote, “We reached out to the APD, and no permit was filed.” It made sense to keep the city informed. I called Mr. Jon Fillman [community event manager for the City of Asheville], and he let us know we were good to go.
Karen: I think the sheriff’s statement was great. [On Feb. 7, Buncombe County Sheriff Quentin Miller put out a statement noting his department will not be partnering with the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, also known as ICE. You can read it at avl.mx/ejh.] Seeing a sheriff publicly say that our people are safe and that we don’t have to worry as much — it helps a lot. A lot of people were scared to attend these demonstrations, and this reassures them in a way.
Was there an “inciting incident” or a moment where you knew it was time to step up for the cause?
Karen: Living in Hendersonville, we are surrounded by apple orchards where our mom has worked. During the election, we wanted to make a yard sign that said, “Remember who picks your apples.” It was meant as a reminder to voters about the people behind it all — we wanted to emphasize that our community matters. That’s where it all started.
Being from Hendersonville, why did you choose downtown Asheville as the place to hold your demonstrations?
Karen: We chose downtown Asheville not only for the beauty of the city but for the narrow roads. We didn’t want the protest to turn into a car show with cars racing down the road. In downtown, we knew that would be pretty difficult.
What is your personal experience with immigration?
Victor: Both of our parents immigrated to this country when they were teenagers. Because our dad entered at such a young age, he was able to file for DACA [Deferred
Action for Childhood Arrivals].
These people have never committed a crime worse than a speeding ticket — we are fighting for them.
We’ve had uncles who were deported. We hear the media talk about immigration, and it feels like they’re talking about our own family. They talk badly about us. We can’t help but look at our relatives and realize that they’ve never done anything wrong, yet they’re being portrayed as criminals.
What’s your experience been like since launching these demonstrations?
Karen: Being interviewed by WLOS was a great experience. Five minutes after they posted it, we were already hearing about it. Obviously, you get a lot of “We are so proud of you,” but you also get a lot of backlash and hate.
One of our favorite comments was, “They should both get deported.” We just laughed at that. We found it funny because, honestly, hate motivates us to keep doing what we’re doing. We’re grateful it happened, but we didn’t put ourselves out there or let people know we were organizing until someone connected us with the media.
Victor: We’re in disbelief quite a bit. When Taylor Thompson [a WLOS news reporter] reached out to us, we were just thinking, “Are we sure this is legit? Is this a prank?” But we think it’s great.
My sister and I are very good friends, and I think the way WLOS titled their article “Sibling duo” really empowers us to keep working together. The media has given us the opportunity to speak for ourselves — they haven’t given us a title we didn’t agree with.
What are your future plans?
Karen: We will definitely be planning more events, but we would like to also start a nonprofit to help support our culture.
Victor: Right now, as these issues are becoming more prominent in the news, we want to make our voices heard and see if we can make some real change happen. We’re going to continue to be passionate about this, regardless of legislation, so starting that nonprofit is still something we’d like to do. For now, though, we are absorbed by the protesting, so that is our primary focus. We’re coming up with names, doing research and trying to make our mission clear. X
Recaps of recent public meetings
Council hacks HACA
After extensive comment from the public, Asheville City Council on Feb. 11 voted 7-0 to trim the size of the Asheville Housing Authority Board of Commissioners from 11 members to nine, specifically ousting Chair Tilman Jackson and Vice Chair Reginald Robinson
HACA oversees 10 public housing developments with 1,534 units and administers housing vouchers for the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), according to the HACA website. Jackson said after the meeting he felt that Council sidestepped due process whereby he could have responded to any inefficiencies. For the full story, visit avl.mx/ejp.
— Brionna Dallara X
Zoning amendments postponed
Asheville City Council initially denied and subsequently postponed its decision on two zoning amendments sought by Barry Bialik , CEO of Compact Cottages and former chair of the Asheville Affordable Housing Committee.
One requested change would allow smaller, single-unit dwellings to be clustered around common open space under the city’s cottage development zoning. The other regards flag lots, which allow two homes to be situated along the same street frontage, with one home behind the other. The lot for the rear home is accessed via a narrow corridor extending to the street — the flag “pole” — which doubles as a shared driveway.
HELENE HEROES: During Asheville City Council’s Feb. 11 meeting, four members of the city’s water department were recognized for their public service during Tropical Storm Helene. Featured, from left, are Justin Rice, Oliver Burns, Levi Soulsby and Jud Bledsoe. Photo by Brionna Dallara
The change would allow narrower “poles,” which would make flag lots possible on deep and narrow lots.
Both issues will be revisited at Council’s March 11 meeting. For more information, visit avl.mx/ejp
— Brionna Dallara X
Students falling behind
Midyear data shows students in Asheville City Schools (ACS) are behind last year’s cohort. A likely contributing factor is the 22 days of canceled classes due to Tropical Storm Helene.
District administrators told the Asheville City Board of Education
at its Feb. 10 meeting that about 60% of this year’s students in kindergarten through fifth grade are at or above reading benchmarks compared with about 65% last year.
In math, students in kindergarten, first and second grades also lag their peers in 2023-24. Those proficient in number-sense tests were 77% of the total last year but 71% this year.
Administrators viewed the results positively considering the significant loss of teaching days. For the full story, visit avl.mx/ejq.
— Greg Parlier X
These stories were supported by the Fund for Investigative Reporting and Editing.
GRANTS OF ALL SHADES
ArtsAVL gave out 41 Grassroots Arts Program grants in 2024-25 ranging from $2,500-$7,00 for programmatic and operating support for nonprofit arts organizations in Buncombe County. Recipients include organizations working in arts for healing, dance, puppetry, music, children’s theater, glass, fiber arts, literature and more. ArtsAVL is transitioning from artist relief grants to arts business relief grants later this month. Other grants available:
• SouthArts will begin offering $2,000 grants for artists starting March 19. For more information, visit avl.mx/eji
• WNC Strong: Helene Business Recovery Grant provided up to $25,000 for for-profit businesses located within Buncombe County. It’s out of funds but started an interest list. For more information, visit avl.mx/ejj.
• Always Asheville Fund provides $5,000 to $10,000 grants to small independent travel and hospitality businesses with at least two employees located in Buncombe County. For more information, visit avl.mx/eai. X
PRIME LIBRARIAN
ROAD UPDATE MEETINGS SLATED
The N.C. Department of Transportation is hosting public meetings regarding major highway recovery projects in Gerton and Bat Cave and Chimney Rock.
The first meeting is about repairs on U.S. 74A in Gerton from Bearwallow Mountain Road to the U.S. 64/U.S. 74/N.C. 9 intersection in Bat Cave. The meeting runs 5-7 p.m., Tuesday, Feb. 25, at Bat Cave Baptist Church, 5095 Chimney Rock Road.
The second meeting concerns replacing the U.S. 64 bridge and reconstruction of about 2.6 miles of U.S. 64/74A. The meeting runs 5-7 p.m., Wednesday, Feb. 26, at Lake Lure Classical Academy, 1058 Island Creek Road. For more information, visit avl.mx/ejk. X
Open seats
The Buncombe County Tourism Development Authority is seeking candidates to fill three vacancies on the nine-member Tourism Product Development Fund Committee. The panel recommends major tourism capital projects that will increase hotel stays and boost economic development in Buncombe County, according to a press release. Two members must be an owner or operator of hotels, motels or other taxable lodging accommodations. The third member must have tourism, legal, financial, economic development, architecture or engineering expertise. It’s a three-year term. The application deadline is 5 p.m. Friday, Feb. 28. For more information, visit avl.mx/ejf X
Amber Westall Briggs, director of the AveryMitchell-Yancey Regional Library System, was named the 2024 N.C. Library Director of the Year.
“Amber’s true testament as a library director has been her unwavering advocacy for upholding the First Amendment and standing steadfast that the public library should be representative of all people,” noted Melanie Morgan, director of the Neuse Regional Libraries, in a press release. X
The YMCA of WNC is offering a free day pass if you show a receipt that you spent $15 or more at a local business in February. Participants will be entered in a drawing for a free threemonth pass. The Love Local offer is available at any YMCA in Buncombe, Henderson or McDowell counties through February. For more information, visit avl.mx/eje. X
Helene’s toll on Ingles
First-quarter profits at Ingles Markets fell from $43.4 million in fiscal year 2024 to $16.6 million in fiscal year 2025 because of Tropical Storm Helene, according to an Ingles press release. Four stores closed due to damage from the storm, and only one has reopened. The remaining three stores are expected to reopen later this year. The company estimates that approximately $55 million to $65 million of revenue was lost during the threeweek period immediately following the storm. Net sales totaled $1.29 billion for the quarter that ended Dec. 28, 2024, a decrease of 13% compared with $1.48 billion for the quarter that ended Dec. 30, 2023. X
of the Pet
Meet Darla! As Brother Wolf Animal Rescue points out, she's so squishy and adorable! Darla loves other dogs and would thrive in a multipet household. She loves to play, cuddle and learn new tricks. Darla regularly falls asleep in her foster's lap after a play session. Go to avl.mx/ckd or email info@bwar.org to find out how to adopt this sweetie. X
Capturing Helene
Local creatives document Tropical Storm Helene through unique lenses
VISUAL AID: Local photographers and videographers took to the streets in the immediate aftermath of Tropical Storm Helene. Xpress recently caught up with several of these artists to learn more about their process and experiences. Featured images, clockwise from top left, by Sarah Jones Decker, Rebecca MacNeice, Patrick Bresnan and Rod Murphy
BY BRIONNA DALLARA
bdallara@mountainx.com
When Tropical Storm Helene ripped through Western North Carolina on Sept. 27, seemingly everyone took out their phones to document the colossal destruction around them.
Local professional photographers and videographers did the same, strapping on their equipment as soon as they could to venture into the flooded landscapes. For some, their journey was self-guided, snapping film to immortalize places personal to them. Others landed temporary gigs with national news teams.
The following stories highlight some of the individuals who used their own unique lens to capture the storm and its aftermath.
DAILY SIRENS
In the weeks immediately following Helene, filmmaker Rod Murphy would leave his home in Black Mountain, camera in hand, with no destination in mind. In pursuit of documenting his community’s resilience and trauma, he let the day’s events determine his route.
A filmmaker by trade, Murphy has produced documentaries as well as corporate and nonprofit videos.
In the early days of recovery, the United Way of Asheville and Buncombe County reached out to Murphy. The collaboration resulted in the videographer nestled with troops on the back of a military vehicle and in a helicopter filming aerial footage.
Later on, Murphy connected with both local and national news stations. Meanwhile, throughout his daily outings, residents pointed him to various recovery efforts in nearby neighborhoods and hollers.
“It happened day after day after day, just being in weird situations that I’d never thought of,” Murphy says. These unique experiences, he
continues, are what fuels him as an artist. “You get into people’s lives that you would never know anything about otherwise.”
The footage he captured in Helene’s wake was different from anything Murphy previously shot. Typically, Murphy says, there’s a lot of nuance with how things are filmed, and the process can sometimes feel overly curated. Even with documentary films, he’s found himself jaded because “people just present themselves the way they want to be seen.” But in the case of Helene, “everyone was so raw, so absolutely their true selves,” he says.
Contrary to a polished documentary, Murphy says he intentionally kept in the loud daily sirens and muffled helicopters that marked the initial weeks of recovery. These sounds, he says, are the score to his series.
So far, Murphy has amassed 20 hours of footage through his independent and organizational projects. Six of his personal video projects are published on his YouTube channel @rodmurphy011.
“You can feel the mood when you look at these things. There’s desperation, but also, everybody’s so grateful to be there, and they’re trying to help,” Murphy says. “As much as it’s nice to not be in that moment, it’s good to remember those moments.”
WINDOWS TO THE SOUL
In downtown Marshall, an area hit hard by Helene, Sarah Jones Decker has spent the past several months capturing her fellow community members in black-and-white stills.
A resident for over 20 years, Decker wears several hats around town — a professional photographer, a local author, co-owner of Roots Bottom Farm and a former professor of art and photography at Mars Hill University.
Decker says she used to prompt her students with the philosophical question “Are you a maker or a finder?” In the aftermath of Helene, she’s found that her answer is a fusion of the two.
“I’ve always been a finder,” Decker says. “But in this project, it’s challenged me because not only am I a finder, I’ve also found my voice as a maker.”
Once a person or location catches her eye, Decker captures them on tintypes — a process popularized during the Civil War. Tintypes are produced by pouring collodion directly on a thin sheet of blackened metal instead of glass, which is then immersed in silver nitrate to make it light sensitive and able to produce an image. The entire process needs to be completed before the plate dries out.
“There’s nothing fast about wet plate collodion,” Decker says. Because the process involves light-sensitive chemicals, a darkroom is needed. To make the process work on the road, Decker says she put on her “maker” hat and built her own mobile darkroom in the back of her Subaru.
The first image she took post-Helene was of Joel Friedman, owner of Zuma Coffee & Provisions, a staple in downtown Marshall for 22 years. (Despite extensive damage, Friedman is working to reopen
the business later this year.) When Decker approached him, she says Friedman knew immediately where he wanted to be photographed — in the barren space that once held his shop’s kitchen and office.
“And he went and sat in the rubble,” Decker says. “The picture showed up in the fixer, and I started crying, I was so emotional.”
When Decker posted a digital scan of the tintype on Facebook, the community’s response was immediate and heartfelt. Since that time, Decker has taken 85 additional portraits with plans to keep going.
The process has been therapeutic, Decker says, and allows both her and her subjects to slow down during the whirlwind of recovery tasks.
Decker recalls more than one instance where she and her subject have stood on the street crying together as the photos develop.
“There’s something just so raw and truthful about black-and-white photography,” Decker says, describing the tintypes as windows to the soul.
She hopes sharing these photos will help outsiders see how special Marshall and its community members are.
“I hope that they see the beauty, strength and resilience of a really special place and the people that make it special,” Decker says. “Marshall is often referred to as ‘Magic Town,’
and making these tintypes in the street really feels like the magic that I can share to the greater magic that we’re creating as a community together during this difficult time.”
To learn more about her work, visit avl.mx/ejd.
CONTINUES ON PAGE 12
years!
INITIAL SHOT: The first tintype photographer Sarah Jones Decker took post-Helene was of Joel Friedman, owner of Zuma Coffee & Provisions, a staple in downtown Marshall for over 20 years. Photo by Decker
SYMBOLIC SHOOTS
Xpress recently joined cinematographer Rebecca MacNeice for her daily drive, where she captures a raw image at a location impacted by Helene. In some instances, such as this day’s journey, she’s circling back to sites to see how time has altered the landscape. MacNeice posts these photos, unedited, with a date, time and location on her Instagram page @rebeccamacneice.
Traveling down a road in Barnardsville, it’s clear the storm’s impact is far from being in the community’s rearview.
The day’s location is what remains of the home owned by MacNeice’s close friends Christi and Simon Whiteley. The couple, who operate Fleetwood’s in West Asheville, were renting out the property at the time of the storm. No stranger to the site, MacNeice has photographed the property before.
The air is still and heavy that day. The majority of the household goods remain buried beneath mud. We make our way inside. Colorful cabinets hang from hinges — the only
indication that we are in the home’s former kitchen. It’s as if no time has passed since Sept. 27.
In addition to Barnardsville, MacNeice frequently visits Swannanoa River Road, Bat Cave and downtown Marshall.
“In the early days, I would drive around, and then I started realizing I was coming back to the same places over and over again,” MacNeice says.
“These places were part of my emotional landscape over a few decades,” she continues. “Some of these roads and places I go to — my connection to it is as thin as that, but also it’s forever changed. So in a few instances, yes, I’m going to places I liked a lot. But in other places, I’m returning to the scene of the crime and the connection to it at this moment.”
Across from the Whiteley property is another site that MacNeice has previously photographed: a school bus that had been cast in the river during the storm.
The original post on Nov. 6 captured the bus completely overturned. Now, the Barnardsville bus is upright on the river’s bank.
Preparing for the new shoot, MacNeice pulls water-resistant pants over her leggings and tucks them into a pair of rain boots to trudge across the cold waters of the Swannanoa River. Although her trunk is loaded with different video cameras, she chooses to use her phone.
“The most emotionally evocative things come from the smaller cameras,” MacNeice says.
THROUGH JUNE’S EYES
A little boy in colorful pajamas complete with a neon helmet and ski goggles stands in front of the ruin that once was the playground in Carrier Park. This is just one of many photos filmmaker Patrick Bresnan has captured of his 4-year-old son, June, post-Helene.
A lot of Bresnan’s photos aim to document Helene through June’s eyes, chronicling his son’s costumed journey, standing as a bright contrast to the debris-torn world around him. In some photographs June is waiting in line for bottled water; in others,
he paints fallen tree limbs. And, of course, there are plenty of his pictures of him at parks.
“Many of the places that we used to go to were along the river,” Bresnan says. “It’s hard to just let go of it, you want to go back and just imagine that it will be there. So, we’ve been going to these places, maybe just as a kind of therapy. And coming to terms with the fact that it’s not going to be the same.”
Bresnan is a full-time videographer whose short films have premiered at film festivals such as Sundance and Cannes. But in the wake of Helene, he’s focused much of his efforts on still shots.
He says there’s incentive to capture places as they are — before they’re bulldozed or hauled away.
“We want to remember the level of destruction and we want to remember what we’ve lost before it’s rebuilt,” Bresnan says. “You create an image so that we can remember what happened. Because in three years, these landscapes along the Swannanoa and in the River Arts District, they’ll be completely different, and tourists will come, and it will be as if that part of Asheville ... never was there.”
In addition to his still shots, Bresnan also filmed clips for the federally funded broadcasting network Voice of America to document FEMA’s response.
Bresnan is no stranger to documenting disasters. In 2005, he worked with the Mennonites who volunteered to rebuild homes in New Orleans in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.
“I spent a lot of time on the Gulf Coast post-Katrina, then we had Ike, Hurricane Harvey. Then when I lived in Austin, we had something called the Bastrop fires, which were these massive forest fires,” Bresnan says.
Bresnan and MacNeice have a future project planned, wherein they will float down the Swannanoa River to document the destruction.
“There’s very long-term consequences of this for people and for the region, and those are the stories that are harder to tell because people fall further and further to the margins,” Bresnan says. “Through these photos and keeping people here and within these stories, we can keep the awareness on the region.”
Taking the photos for Bresnan has helped him come to terms with the new world around him.
“I’m photographing it as a way to process it, as a way to really understand what people have lost and to really process how much work we have to do to restore the rivers and to restore people’s homes and people’s lives,” he says. X
WINDOW FRAME: This was the first photograph Rebecca MacNeice captured post-Helene. She intentionally uses car windows to frame the images, symbolic of the fatalities that occurred in vehicles. Photo courtesy of MacNeice
COMMUNITY CALENDAR
FEB. 19 - FEB. 27 , 2025
For a full list of community calendar guidelines, please visit mountainx.com/calendar. For questions about free listings, call 828-251-1333, opt. 4. For questions about paid calendar listings, please call 828-251-1333, opt. 1.
Online-only events
Feature, page 22
More info, page 25
WELLNESS
Therapeutic Recreation
Adult Morning Movement
Wednesday mornings are all about active games, physical activities, and sports adapted to accommodate all skill levels.
WE (2/19, 26), 10am, Tempie Avery Montford Community Center, 34 Pearson Ave
Balance, Agility, Strength, Stretch
This weekly class for adults focuses on flexibility, balance, stretching, and strength. Bring your own exercise mat.
WE (2/19, 26), 10am, Harvest House, 205 Kenilworth Rd
Thrive 55+ Exercise
Party
Every Wednesday, active adults will come together for chair exercise, balance challenges, and strength training.
WE (2/19, 26), 11am, Burton Street Community Center, 134 Burton St
Qigong
Gentle form of exercise composed of movement, posture, breathing, and meditation used to promote health and spirituality.
WE (2/19, 26), 11:15am, Harvest House, 205 Kenilworth Rd
Intro to the Fitness
Center
Learn how to use equipment and machines in the fitness center to jump start a regular wellness routine.
TH (2/20), 1pm, Stephens-Lee Recreation Center, 30 George Washington Carver Ave
Qi Gong for Overall Health & Wellness
Learn how to relax your mind and body through slow intentional movements.
This class focuses on strengthening, stretching, and aerobics every Friday.
FR (2/21), 10am, Harvest House, 205 Kenilworth Rd
Wild Souls Authentic Movement w/Renee Trudeau
An expressive move-
ment class designed to help you get unstuck, enjoy cardio movement, boost immune health, dissolve stress and celebrate community.
SU (2/23), 9:30am, Dunn's Rock Community Center, 461 Connestee Rd, Brevard
Sunday Morning Meditation Group
Gathering for a combination of silent sitting and walking meditation, facilitated by Worth Bodie.
SU (2/23), 10am, The Lodge at Quietude, 1130 Montreat Rd, Black Mountain
Himalayan Sound Bath
Meditation
Imagine the soothing tones of Himalayan singing bowls washing over you, calming your mind, and rejuvenating your spirit.
SA (2/22), SU (2/23), 11am, Somatic Sounds, 157 S Lexington Ave
Prenatal & Postpartum
Yoga
A rejuvenating and relaxing yoga session designed specifically for pregnant and postpartum folks.
SU (2/23), noon, W Asheville Yoga, 602 Haywood Rd
Serenity Sound Bath
A one-hour Serenity Sound Bath and experience a deeply immersive, full-body sound and vibrational experience.
SU (2/23), 1pm, Center for Spiritual Living Asheville, 2 Science Mind Way
Queer Yoga
This class is donation-based and centered towards creating an affirming and inclusive space for all queer folks.
SU (2/23), 1:30pm, W Asheville Yoga, 602 Haywood Rd
Mindfulness Exercise
Participate in a free exercise designed to help you drop into the present moment. Exercises may rotate from week to week, but this time is intended to give the brain practice.
MO (2/24), 9:15am, Corduroy Lounge, 444 Haywood Rd Ste
Strength & Exercise
Workout at your own pace in a fun atmosphere in this
A HEART-Y GATHERING:
Haywood Regional Medical Center hosts its Haywood Heart Expo on Thursday, Feb. 27, at the Haywood Regional Health & Fitness Center. This free, community-driven expo begins at 9 a.m. and is aimed at raising awareness about heart health while providing local residents with the resources and knowledge needed to make informed decisions about their cardiovascular fitness. Photo courtesy of Haywood Regional Medical Center
weekly class for active adults working on overall fitness and strength.
MO (2/24), 9:15am, Harvest House, 205 Kenilworth Rd
Prenatal Yoga
Paulina, a yoga teacher and certified birth doula, will guide you through gentle poses and breathing exercises to help you connect with your changing body.
MO (2/24), 5:30pm, W Asheville Yoga, 602 Haywood Rd
Zumba Gold & Silverobics
Calorie-burning, fun, low-impact class that incorporates dance and fitness for older adults each week.
TU (2/25), noon, Harvest House, 205 Kenilworth Rd
Drumming for Exercise Jam to some tunes while getting a great, low-impact arm and core workout. No need to be a pro drummer.
TU (2/25), 1:30pm, Harvest House, 205 Kenilworth Rd
Breathwork, Movement & Meditation
Special practice combining restorative yoga, somatic breathwork, and meditation, designed to promote deep relaxation and nervous system balance.
TU (2/25), 6:30pm, Old Fort Yoga, 45 Catawba Ave, Old Fort
Free Tai Chi for Beginners Improve your balance, fitness, and flexibility without putting stress on the joints.
WE (2/26), 9am, Marshall Public Library, 1335 N Main St, Marshall
Community Yoga & Mindfulness
Free monthly event with Inspired Change Yoga that will lead you into a morning of breathwork, meditation and yoga. Bring your own mat.
WE (2/26), 10:30am, AmeriHealth Caritas, 216 Asheland Ave
Tai Chi Chih
Move towards better health and more happiness with mindful, moving meditation.
WE (2/26), noon, Harvest House, 205 Kenilworth Rd
Kitten Yoga
Bring your yoga mat and recharge your energy while being assaulted by adorable, adoptable kittens.
WE (2/26), 6pm, House of Black Cat Magic, Co., 841 Haywood Rd
SUPPORT GROUPS
Nicotine Anonymous
People share their experience, strength and hope to stop using nicotine. You don’t need to be stopped, just have a desire to attend.
Magnetic Minds: Depression & Bipolar Support Group
A free weekly peer-led meeting for those living with depression, bipolar, and related mental health challenges. For more information contact (828) 367-7660.
SA (2/22), 2pm, First Congregational UCC of Asheville, 20 Oak St
NAMI Connection
Trained peer facilitators guide you in learning how to empower yourself in a place that offers respect, understanding, encouragement, and hope.
TU (2/25), 6pm, NAMIWNC, 356 Biltmore Ave
DANCE
Open-Level Adult Dance
Each class will feature a full-body warm-up, specific skill practice, and a dance combination to your favorite music.
WE (2/19, 26), 5:30pm, Black Mountain Center for the Arts, 225 W State St, Black Mountain Latin Night Wednesday w/DJ Mtn Vibez
A Latin dance social featuring salsa, bachata, merengue, cumbia, and reggaeton with dance lessons for all skill levels.
WE (2/19, 26), 8pm, One World Brewing West, 520 Haywood Rd
Tap Dance: Beginner Tap dance for beginners teaches the basics through a combination of exercise, music, and incredible fun.
TH (2/20), 10am, Harvest House, 205 Kenilworth Rd
Tap Dance: Intermediate Fun and active class for students who have already taken beginner tap here or elsewhere. Students must provide their own tap shoes. TH (2/20), 10:45am, Harvest House, 205 Kenilworth Rd
Tap Dance: Advanced Fun and active twice-weekly class for advanced students.
We Line Dance Brenda Mills leads this inclusive exercise class that uses line dancing to get your body moving.
TH (2/20), 6:15pm, Stephens-Lee Recreation Center, 30 George Washington Carver Ave Bachata Dance Lesson & Social Live DJ Bachata nights with some Cha Cha, Cumbia, Merengue and Salsa added to the mix.
A true beginners course for those who are new to line dance taught by Liz Atkinson. MO (2/24), 10:30am, Harvest House, 205 Kenilworth Rd
Monday Night Contra Dance
A welcoming environment for anyone who would like to contra dance. Lessons start at 7 p.m. and a social dance starts at 7:30 p.m. MO (2/24), 7:30pm, A-B Tech, Genevieve Circle
ART
Forces of Nature: Ceramics from the Hayes Collection Forces of Nature is drawn from the collection of Andrew and Hathia Hayes, demonstrating the different approaches to ceramics in Western North Carolina.Gallery open daily, 11am, closed
Tuesday. Exhibition through March, 2025. Asheville Art Museum, 2 S Pack Square
Asheville Strong: Celebrating Art & Community After Hurricane Helene
An exhibition of artwork by artists who live and work in the Helene-affected Appalachia region. This special, non-juried exhibition celebrates the strength and diversity of our regional arts community. Gallery open Wednesday through Sunday, 11am. Exhibition through May. 5, Asheville Art Museum, 2 S Pack Square
How We Heal
This special exhibition will feature three new artists: Cynthia Brody, Marlon Vidal and Kathleen Stern. How We Heal is a tribute to the inhabitants of WNC, who have been so resilient in the long recovery post-Helene. Gallery open daily, 11am. Exhibition through Feb. 28. Asheville Gallery of Art, 82 Patton Ave
Look Up Asheville: A Photographic Exploration of Asheville Architecture
The exhibition features vivid photographs by local photographer Michael Oppenheim. The photographs will be showcased on canvas as gallery wraps and traditional archival photographic prints. Gallery open Monday through Friday, 8:30am. Exhibition through February, 28.
John M. Crawford Jr. Gallery, 360 Asheville School Rd
Torn Exhibition
This exhibition features the captivating exploration of art created through processes of addition and subtraction, where fragments and remnants take on new life. Gallery open Monday through Friday, 10am. Exhibition through Feb. 28. Black Mountain Center for the Arts, 225 W State St, Black Mountain 2025 School of Art & Design Faculty Biennial This exhibition provides students and the community an opportunity to view recent work created by distinguished faculty members whose primary research output is studio-based. Gallery open Tuesday through Friday, 10am. Exhibition through May, 2. WCU Bardo Arts Center, 199 Centennial Dr, Cullowhee
Anti Form: Robert Morris’s Earth Projects
The suite of lithographic drawings by Robert Morris presents a series of ideas for ten works of art shaped out of earth, atmospheric conditions, and built environments. Gallery open Wednesday through Sunday, 11am. Exhibition through May 2025.
Asheville Art Museum, 2 S Pack Square
Greetings from Asheville: Tourism & Transformation in the Postcard Age
This exhibition explores how the land, the people, and the built environment of Asheville and its surrounding environs were interpreted through early 20th century vintage postcards. Gallery open Wednesday through Sunday, 11am.
Exhibition through May. 30, 2025.
Asheville Art Museum, 2 S Pack Square
COMMUNITY MUSIC
Men in Harmony: Open Singing Jam
Men's a capella ensemble hosts an open jam session to scout for new talented members as well as share an evening of music. For more information contact Jim Gordon at (828) 545-2262.
WE (2/19), 6:45pm, St. Matthias Church, 1 Dundee St
Okonski: Entrance Music Album Release
After nearly two years, Okonski returns with Entrance Music, an album that finds the trio at the height of their improvisational prowess.
TH (2/20), 7pm, Harvest Records, 415-B Haywood Rd
Tony's Trischka's EarlJam
This is a special tribute to Earl Scruggs concert that also features special guest Woody Platt. Tony Trischka is considered one of the most influential Banjo players in the roots music world.
TH (2/20), 7pm, 185 King Street, 185 King St, Brevard
Soprano Larisa Martínez
Witness the enchanting voice of soprano Larisa Martínez, one of opera’s brightest stars.
TH (2/20), 7:30pm, Parker Concert Hall at Brevard Music Center, 349 Andante Ln, Brevard
An Evening of Bluegrass & Klezmer Fusion w/Zoe & Cloyd
An electrifying evening of music and cultural celebration with Zoe & Cloyd featuring klezgrass music.
FR (2/21), 7pm, Folkmoot Auditorium, 112 Virginia Ave, Waynesville
JLloyd Mashup
Presents: A Tribute to Paul Simon Immerse yourself in an unforgettable evening as The JLloyd MashUp pays tribute to the legendary Paul Simon.
SA (2/22), 7:30pm, Hendersonville Theatre, 229 S Washington St, Hendersonville
Brevard Philharmonic Presents: España Immerse yourself in the vibrant sounds of Spain with the Brevard Philharmonic’s España.
SU (2/23), 3pm, Porter Center, Brevard College, 1 Brevard College Dr, Brevard
Greg Hager
A free concert of Christian country music with Award-winning North Dakota singer and songwriter Greg Hager.
All are welcome.
SU (2/23), 4pm, St. Mark's Lutheran Church, 10 North Liberty St
Pan Harmonia: Open Rehearsals
As part of Pan Harmonia’s mission of accessibility and inclusivity, Pan Harmonia is offering two open rehearsals to the community. Community members are welcome to drop into either or both of these rehearsals, free of charge.
TU (2/25), 11am, Enka-Candler Library, 1404 Sandhill Rd, Candler
Irish Session
White Horse hosts a traditional Irish-style session every second and fourth Wednesday. WE (2/26), 5pm, White Horse Black Mountain, 105C Montreat Rd, Black Mountain
COMMUNITY WORKSHOPS
Change Your Palate Cooking Demo
This free lunchtime food demonstration is open to all but tailored towards those with type 2 diabetes or hypertension and/or their caretakers.
WE (2/19), noon, AmeriHealth Caritas, 216 Asheland Ave
Mountain Stitchers Gather with other makers while you work on knitting, crocheting, stitching, or other personal fiber projects.
WE (2/19), 1pm, Harvest House, 205 Kenilworth Rd
Beginning Cherokee Language
Learn a new language in the new year with beginner Cherokee lessons on the Qualla Boundary.
WE (2/19), 5pm, Museum of the Cherokee People, 589 Tsali Blvd., Cherokee
Craft & Connect
Get crafty and acquire new skills while connecting with peers.
TH (2/20), 7pm, Dr Wesley Grant Sr. Southside Community Center, 285 Livingston St
Meadow Workshop
Emily Sampson, founder of Patchwork Meadows will discuss the process of establishing and maintaining meadows and pocket meadows in the Asheville area.
FR (2/21), 6pm, Buncombe County Soil and Water Conservation District, 49 Mount Carmel Rd
SCORE: How to Start a Business
Learn 10 key topics every business owner needs to know and start mapping your own plan for starting a small business.
SA (2/22), 9am, A-B Tech Small Business Center, 1465 Sand Hill Rd, Candler
Intro To Ashtanga Workshop
Led by an experienced instructor, we’ll guide you through the foundational principles of Ashtanga, focusing on breath, movement, and mindfulness.
SA (2/22), noon, W Asheville Yoga, 602 Haywood Rd
Never too Late: Starting a Business at 50+
Learn how to turn your lifetime of experience into a fulfilling and profitable business venture.
MO (2/24), 1pm, A-B
Tech Small Business Center, 1465 Sand Hill Rd, Candler
Asheville-Buncombe
Senior Games Clinics
Enhance skills and discover new passions through APR’s free clinics, available to all interested participants in this year’s Asheville-Buncombe Senior Games.
TU (2/25), 10am, WAsheville Park, 198 Vermont Ave
Therapeutic Recreation
Adult Crafting
A variety of cooking and crafts, available at two different times.
TU (2/25), 10am and 11am, Murphy-Oakley Community Center, 749 Fairview Rd
Getting it All Done: Time Management for Small Business Owners
In this seminar; learn how to use time, people and stuff management skills that allow you to be flexible and meet long-term challenges while dealing with last minute changes.
TU (2/25), 1pm, A-B Tech Small Business Center, 1465 Sand Hill Rd, Candler
Sticky Situations: Make Your Own Slime
A hands-on workshop to learn the secrets of master slime making.
TU (2/25), 5:30pm, Tempie Avery Montford Community Center, 34 Pearson Ave,
Agritourism Summit
Gain valuable insights and practical strategies to attract visitors, diversify your income streams, and create memorable experiences for your guests.
TH (2/27), 9am, Haywood Community College, 185 Freedlander Dr, Clyde Access to Capital
Whether you’re a start-up or interested in growing your business, this workshop is here to guide you through the process to secure a business loan. Register at avl.mx/ejs.
TH (2/27), 11am, Online
One-Pot Meals
Learn to make fuss-free dinners in a pot or a pan.
TH (2/27), 5:30pm, North Carolina Cooperative Extension-Madison County Center, 258 Carolina Ln, Marshall
LITERARY
Asheville StorySLAM:
Love Hurts
Prepare a five-minute tale about the agony of deferred love, the misery of good love, gone bad, the anguish of one-way love, or love that hurts so good.
TH (2/20), 7:30pm, The Grey Eagle, 185 Clingman Ave
Poetry w/Wayne Caldwell: River Rd
North Carolina author
Wayne Caldwell will share his latest poetry collection, River Road
SA (2/22), 3pm, City Lights Bookstore, 3 E Jackson St, Sylva
Blanket Fort Storytelling Night
Get cozy and prepare for a night of whimsical, entertaining tales told underneath a blanket fort.
SU (2/23), 8pm, Crow & Quill, 106 N Lexington Ave
Flooded Poetry
Each poet will be able to share 2-3 poems, and occasionally we will have local celebrity poets close out our night with a featured reading.
MO (2/24), 6:30pm, Flood Gallery, 802 Meter & Melody: Poetry Night
An open mic for poetry, hosted by Dill.
WE (2/26), 7pm, Static Age Loft, 116 N Lexington Ave
Kristen Gentry & Halle
Hill
Kristen Gentry & Halle
Hill will read and discuss their story collections, Mama Said and Good Women, at Western Carolina University's Hunter Library.
TH (2/27), 6pm, Western Carolina University, 176 Central Dr, Cullowhee
Delight: A Counter Cultural Force of Resistance
This program will host author and poet Ross Gay, and will explore how we can find small delights and joy through challenges and adversity. Student winners from the art contest "Big World, Small Delights" will be presenting their work.
TH (2/27), 7pm, Asheville High School, 419 McDowell St
THEATER & FILM
Script Reading for Confidence, Voiceover, or Screen
Stephanie Morgan, owner of Corduroy, will direct and coach 2-3 readers as they each work thru one short script, allowing for class feedback.
A dramatic comedy that follows successful television actor Andrew Rally as he struggles with taking on the dream role of Hamlet, dealing with a girlfriend who is keeping a firm grip on her chastity, and playing host to the ghost of John Barrymore, who is clothed as Hamlet.
FR (2/21), SA (2/22), 7pm, SU (2/23), Black Mountain Center for the Arts, 225 W State St, Black Mountain Into the Woods
The Asheville School Dramatic Society presents this classic musical
production about a baker and his wife who must go on a quest to procure magical items from classic fairy tales to reverse the curse on their family tree.
FR (2/21), 7pm, SA (2/22), 2pm, The Asheville School, 360 Asheville School Rd
Golden Era Movie
Magic
An afternoon of beloved classic films. Grab some popcorn and get ready for a trip down memory
Ln with this week's feature film, The Wiz
TU (2/25), 12:45pm, Tempie Avery Montford Community Center, 34 Pearson Ave
True Home Open Mic
An evening of music, poetry, comedy and stories. Sign up begins at 6pm.
Solstice blends over 8 acrobatic acts with lighting, costumes, music, scenery, and snow to create a unique blend of poetry and circus in a 75-minute show.
TH (2/27), 7:30pm, WCU Bardo Arts Center, 199 Centennial Dr, Cullowhee
MEETINGS & PROGRAMS
Agents Helping Agents
Club
A fun and informative event where real estate agents come together to share tips, tricks, and success stories.
WE (2/19), 9:30am, AmeriHealth Caritas, 216 Asheland Ave
Spill the Beans: Social Group Staff will have fun and engaging questions and prompts to start off conversation with something silly or something deeper.
WE (2/19), 2pm, Harvest House, 205 Kenilworth Rd
The Real Dietrich Bonhoeffer: Theology for Faith In Times of Crisis
This 4-week series will engage Bonhoeffer’s works to help us learn how to be faithful in times of political and social upheaval.
WE (2/19, 26), 6pm, First Baptist Church, 5 Oak St
IBN Biz Lunch: Canton All are invited to attend and promote their business, products, and services, and meet new
referral contacts.
TH (2/20), 11:30am, Southern Porch, 449 Main St, Canton
Job Search Survival Kit w/Jeff Percival
Participants will examine Job Search Survival Kits and work to understand what they need to do to get through periods of unemployment.
This is a great opportunity to get outside and get some exercise. It's also a fun time to meet others in recovery, build community and create connection. No experience is necessary.
TH (2/20), 3:30pm, Richmond Hill Park, 300 Richmond Hill Dr, Asheville
Celebrate Black History: Soul Food Supper Come hungry for the annual Soul Food Supper co-sponsored by East End Valley Street
Neighborhood and Stephens-Lee Alumni associations. Please call (828) 350-2058 for more information and register in advance.
TH (2/20), 6pm, Stephens-Lee Recreation Center, 30 George Washington Carver Ave
A Course in Miracles w/ Patricia Dobberke
Patricia will introduce a system of thinking to help with suffering and living the good (God) life.
FR (2/21), 1pm, Center for Spiritual Living Asheville, 2 Science Mind Way
Burton Street Black History Month Discussion
A discussion on the history of the Burton Street Community and its founder, Edward W Pearson.
FR (2/21), 6pm, Burton Street Community Center, 134 Burton S Conversations w/Cats
Mix and mingle with cat lovers from all walks of life and twelve adoptable housepanthers. All proceeds from this event will be donated to Binx's Home for Black Cats.
FR (2/21), 6pm, House of Black Cat Magic, Co., 841 Haywood Rd
Information Session for Guided Trip to Provence
This is an Info Session to learn all about an upcoming guided trip to Provence.
SA (2/22), 10am, The Rhu, 10 South Lexington Ave
Find Your Familiar: Black Cat Adoption Event
A black cat adoption event that will feature black kittens galore of all shapes, sizes, and ages. Find your loyal guardians, energy protectors, healers, and the truest of companions.
SA (2/22), 12pm, House of Black Cat Magic, Co., 841 Haywood Rd
Alexander Chapel Baptist Church & Cemetery
Annette Coleman, caretaker of Alexander Chapel Baptist Church, will share the history of this church. The cemetery is the permanent resting place for Black residents of Leicester, Alexander, and the surrounding areas. Register at avl.mx/9ey.
SA (2/22), 2pm, Online
Historic Floods & Landslides: What Have We Learned
Learn about what makes WNC a flood and landslide prone area and how we can protect ourselves and our community.
The program is free but advanced registration is required.
SA (2/22), 2pm, Bo Thomas Auditorium, Blue Ridge Community College, 180 W Campus Dr, Flat Rock
Coloring w/Cats: Teens & Adults
Set time for yourself and cuddle with the panthers, meet other cat-lovers, and color a beautiful picture of a cat from our adult coloring books.
SU (2/23), 2pm, House of Black Cat Magic, Co., 841 Haywood Rd
Family Open Gym
Weekly time in the gym reserved for all ages to shoot hoops and play other active games as a family.
SU (2/23), 4pm, Dr Wesley Grant Sr. Southside Community Center, 285 Livingston St
Being an LGBTQ Writer in the Trump Era
UNC Asheville's Great Smokies Writing Program presents a panel on being an LGBTQ writer in the Trump era, featuring authors Dustin Brookshire, Diamond Forde, L. Danzis, & Bruce Spang. Free registration required.
SU (2/23), 5pm, Malaprop's Bookstore and Cafe, 55 Haywood St Alive After 55+
A program for active older adults to socialize, play board games and puzzles, create in group art activities, and more.
MO (2/24), TU (2/25), 10am, Linwood Crump Shiloh Community Center, 121 Shiloh Rd
Creative Check-in
This 1-hr set-up-yourweek session is designed for just about anyone who wants a supportive group to help them keep account of their dreams and goals, and how they play out in the week.
MO (2/24), 10am, Corduroy Lounge, 444 Haywood Rd Ste 103
Connecting Conversations
Explore conversations built around curiosity, understanding, and openness to develop stronger connections, to be heard, and to empathize with different viewpoints.
MO (2/24), 12:45pm, Peri Social House, 406 W State St, Black Mountain Black Men Monday
Featuring a local group that has stepped up in the community to advocate for and mentor students through academic intervention.
MO (2/24), 5:30pm, AmeriHealth Caritas, 216 Asheland Ave
Dharma & Discuss w/ John Orr
This monthly guided meditation gives a Dharma talk, and leads a discussion on various topics related to meditation and Buddhist teachings.
MO (2/24), 6:30pm, The Lodge at Quietude, 1130 Montreat Rd, Black Mountain
Forest Farming Tour
In this agroforestry tour, you'll learn about the farmers' adaptive management at a diverse,
unique and beautiful mountaintop farm. Registration is required.
The mission of the retreat is to provide a safe space for veterans to explore various artistic mediums, socialize with peers, and find calm and comfort in creating. Free to all Veterans, their spouses, partners and adult children.
TU (2/25), 5:30pm, Givens Gerber Park, 40 Gerber Rd
Find the Right Job for You Career counselors
help teens and young adults create resumes, learn how to fill out job applications, and refine job searches based on skills and interests.
TU (2/25), 6pm, Stephens-Lee Recreation Center, 30 George Washington Carver Ave
IBN Biz Lunch
All are invited to attend and promote their business, products, and services, and meet new referral contacts.
WE (2/26), 11:30am, Gemelli by Strada Italiano, 70 Westgate Parkway
Psyche Williams-Forson: When W go Meet the Trains: Black Women, Food and Power in the American South Author Psyche Williams-Forson will delve into the ways Black women have used, and continue to use, food to shape cuisines in and beyond the south, while defining their sense of self. See p22
WE (2/26), 6pm, Highsmith Student Union, 1 University Heights
Low-Cost Community Cat Neuter Clinic
You must schedule and pay for your appointment prior to showing up.
TH (2/27), 8am, House of Black Cat Magic, Co., 841 Haywood Rd
NSA-WNC Meeting
Professional keynote speakers, coaches, trainers, facilitators, and consultants who cover a broad range of topics, skills, & knowledge.
Bring a stack of business cards, and if you like, a door prize to add to our drawing at the end of the meeting.
TH (2/27), 11:30am, The Village Porch, 51 North Merrimon Ave, Ste 113, Woodfin
GAMES & CLUBS
Grant Southside Center
Walking Club
Walk inside in the gym or outside, if the weather is nice, with themed music each week.
WE (2/19, 26), 10:30am, Dr Wesley Grant Sr. Southside Community Center, 285 Livingston St
Bid Whist Make bids, call trumps, and win tricks. Every Saturday for fun competition with the community.
SA (2/22), 1pm, Dr Wesley Grant Sr. Southside Community Center, 285 Livingston St
Weekly Sunday Scrabble
Weekly scrabble play where you’ll be paired with players of your skill level. All scrabble gear provided.
SU (2/23), 1:30pm, Stephens-Lee Recreation Center, 30 George Washington Carver Ave
Ultimate Bid Whist & Spades
Bring a partner or come solo for a fun evening of competitive bid whist and spades every Tuesday.
TU (2/25), 6pm, Linwood Crump Shiloh Community Center, 121 Shiloh Rd
Indoor Walking for Wellness Club Weather doesn’t matter when you have a community gym. Let us crank up the tunes to get you motivated.
TU (2/25), TH (2/27), 9:15am, Stephens-Lee Recreation Center, 30 George Washington Carver Ave
KID-FRIENDLY PROGRAMS
The Family Music Class
A play-based interactive music and movement program for babies, toddlers, preschoolers, and their grownups.
WE (2/19), 9:30am, Whole Body Chiropractic, 390 S French Broad Ave
Tiny Tykes Wednesday Play Dates
Open play for toddlers to explore bikes, balls, inflatables, climbing structures, and more fun.
WE (2/19), 10am, Stephens-Lee Recreation Center, 30 George Washington Carver Ave
Black Cat Tales: Story Time w/Cats
A special after-school workshop where families with children age 7 and under can relax and foster a love of reading while also socializing with the cats in the lounge.
TH (2/20), 4pm, House of Black Cat Magic, Co., 841 Haywood Rd
Dinner Under Dinos: A Parent’s Night Out
This fun-filled night includes pizza from a local vendor, free exhibit play, custom scavenger hunts for special prizes, and a kid-friendly movie to chill out.
FR (2/21), SA (2/22) 5:30pm, Asheville Museum of Science, 43 Patton Ave
Coloring w/Cats: Kiddie Edition
An artistic session with coloring books and
markers for children ages 13 and under to relax by coloring as they pet cats to reduce stress and anxiety.
SA (2/22), 1pm, House of Black Cat Magic, Co., 841 Haywood Rd
Kids Quiet Play Session
Some benefits, especially useful for children, include mental clarity for distracted youngsters as well as immune boosting, respiratory relief and relief from skin conditions.
SU (2/23), 10am, Asheville Salt Cave, 16 N Liberty St
Little Climbers
A mix of fun games and activities for little adventurers with a focus on building toddlers’ motor skills and balance, climbing and playing on and off the indoor climbing wall.
TU (2/25), 10am, Tempie Avery Montford Community Center, 34 Pearson Ave
Toddler Discovery Time
This open gym time allows toddlers and caregivers to make memories and new friends through structures and unstructured activities.
TU (2/25), 10am, Stephens-Lee Recreation Center, 30 George Washington Carver Ave
World of Games
Grab a controller and best your opponent playing games like Fortnite, Warzone, Madden, and 2K. Board and card games available for those not gaming.
TU (2/25), 6pm, Stephens-Lee Recreation Center, 30 George Washington Carver Ave
LOCAL MARKETS
River Arts District
Farmers Market
Weekly market featuring local fruits, vegetables, meats, bread, honey, eggs, pastries, flowers, crafts and more. SNAP and disaster SNAP are accepted.
WE (2/19, 26), 3pm, AB Tech, 24 Fernihurst Dr, Asheville
Weaverville Winter Tailgate Market
A selection of fresh, locally grown produce, grass fed beef, pork, chicken, rabbit, eggs, cheese, sweet and savory baked goods, artisan bread, body care, eclectic handmade goodies, garden and landscaping plants. Open year round.
WE (2/19), 3pm, 60 Lake Shore Dr Weaverville
Friday Night Sip & Shop
Sip, shop and stroll through the different shops found within the Grove Arcade, every Friday.
FR (2/21), 4pm, Grove Arcade, 1 Page Ave
Swannanoa Farmers Market
This market is all about community, connection, and supporting local vendors. Swannanoa residents get free vendor spaces. Come shop fresh eggs, handcrafted artwork, embroidered clothing, fiber goods, sweet treats, delicious eats, and more.
SA (2/22), 8am, 216 Whitson Ave, 216 Whitson Ave, Swannanoa
Asheville City Market
Featuring local food products, including fresh produce, meat, cheese, bread, pastries, and other artisan products. Every Saturday through December 21.
SA (2/22), 10am, 52 N Market St
North Asheville Tailgate Market
The oldest Saturday morning market in WNC, since 1980. Over 60 rotating vendors providing a full range of local, sustainably produced produce, meats, eggs, cheeses, breads, plants and unique crafts.
SA (2/22), 10am, UNC Asheville, Lot P34, 275 Edgewood Rd
MPRC Pantry
The pantry is available to anyone with needs. Some items available include non-perishable foods, diapers, baby wipes, paper goods, feminine hygiene products and more.
TU (2/25), 3pm, Mills River Presbyterian Church, 10 Presbyterian Church Rd, Mills River
FESTIVALS & SPECIAL EVENTS
57th Annual Winter Vegetable Conference
Attendees will be able to learn about the current issues associated with vegetables and speak with the representatives from agricultural companies and other businesses that support this industry.
WE (2/19), TH (2/20) 8:30am, Crowne Plaza Resort, 1 Resort Dr Black History Celebration
Learn about Black history in Asheville with games, refreshments, and fellowship.
Drop Box Mattress Re-Opening Celebration Swannanoa business reopens post-Helene with a ribbon-cutting.
TH (2/20), 4:30pm, Drop Box Mattress, 104 Eastside Dr Unit 502, Black Mountain
A Taste of Black Legends
A day of honoring, reflecting and celebrating black leaders who have made a difference in Henderson county. There will be tasting samples from Carolina Ace BBQ and keynote
Recommitment to Love Ceremony for Couple & Singles
A heartfelt ceremony filled with love and music to celebrate love with your partner, renew your vows or commit to self-love.
FR (2/21), 7pm, Center for Spiritual Living Asheville, 2 Science Mind Way
Musicians for Overdose Prevention Presents: Dark City Kings & Matt Pless
This musical event will feature two local acts and Musicians for Overdose Prevention will be distributing free naloxone to everyone who attends.
FR (2/21), 8pm, Eda's Hide-a-Way, 1098 New Stock Rd, Weaverville
Plant Bar Presents: Hunter The Gatherer & Haus Maus
Enjoy the rhythmic sounds of Asheville’s hottest local DJ’s, sip endless tea, enjoy local healthy food and take in the vibes.
FR (2/21), 9pm, Plant Bar, 919 Haywood Rd
Bluegrass & BBQ
An annual Bluegrass and BBQ fundraiser with the Enka High FFA chapter. Entertainment will feature Sons of Ralph, Mountain Tradition Cloggers, Flicker of Love Cast Iron.
SA (2/22), 4pm, Enka High School, 475 Enka Lake Rd, Candler
Bimbocon: Bimbo Hell
Your favorite bisexual annual event is back and welcomes all queers, allies and friends for an unforgettable dance party. There will be a vendor market, clothing to swap, a twerking 101 class and more.
SA (2/22), 9pm, The Mule, 131 Sweeten Creek Rd Ste 10
WNC Build & Remodel Expo
Learn practical tips and innovative ideas from building and remodeling professionals, discover the latest offerings from vendors and more.
SU (2/23), 11am, WNC Ag Center’s Davis Event Center, 765 Boylston Hwy, Fletcher
Palestinian Film Festival
A day-long film festival that seeks to highlight the myriad voices of Palestinian resistance, focusing on several full-length films along with multiple shorts and daytime programming appropriate for younger audiences. See p25
SU (2/23), noon, El Porvenir Cultural Center, 17 Westside Dr Pixe Wars: Weekly Retro Game Tournament
The perfect chance to show off your gaming
skills every week. It's free to play and the weekly winner takes home a Hi-Wire gift card.
MO (2/24), 7pm, Hi-Wire Brewing, 197 Hilliard Ave
Haywood Heart Expo
This event is designed to raise awareness about heart health while providing local residents with the resources and knowledge needed to make informed decisions about their cardiovascular well-being.
TH (2/27), 9am, Haywood Regional Hleath & Fitness Center, 72 Leroy George Dr, Clyde Heart Health Awareness Day
Learn different types of heart diseases, causes, symptoms and prevention tips. We will talk about having a healthy diet and exercise tips.
TH (2/27), noon, CenterWell Primary Care, 105 River Hills Rd Ste A
BENEFITS & VOLUNTEERING
15th Annual Battle of the Badges Blood Drive Competition
A good-natured blood drive competition between the Asheville Fire Department, Asheville Police Department, Buncombe County Emergency Medical Service, Buncombe County Sheriff's Office and the North Carolina Hwy Patrol.
WE (2/19), 8am, First Baptist Church, 5 Oak St, Asheville Comedy for Community Supporting Helpmate Comedy for Community brings all your favorite local comedians together each week to support the town we love through a variety of local charities and organizations. This month benefits Helpmate.
SU (2/23), 6:30pm, Catawba Brewing Co. S Slope, 32 Banks Avele Beer & Hymns: Benefiting Black Mountain Center For the Arts Beer & Hymns brings people together to raise a glass and a voice while raising funds for organizations that change the world.
MO (2/24), 7pm, White Horse Black Mountain, 105C Montreat Rd, Black Mountain Resources for Recovery Buncombe County is hosting a series of dropin sessions to connect residents to provide personalized storm recovery support.
TU (2/25), 5pm, AC Reynolds High School, 1 Rocket Dr PSK Gaza Fundraiser Porn Star Karaoke presents a benefit for Gaza.
TH (2/27), 7pm, Sly Grog Lounge, 271 Haywood St
Weird weeds and lasting legacies
Remembering chef Brian Canipelli gsmith@mountainx.com
BY GINA SMITH
Odd plants. I wasn’t sure what to make of that.
It was more than a decade ago at Cucina 24, and I was waffling about whether to venture into the new-tome territory of chef Brian Canipelli’s tasting menu or stick to the known and beloved arena of the restaurant’s phenomenal housemade pastas and pizzas. This bizarre entry among the tasting menu’s courses gave me pause. “Trust me on this one,” the server assured me.
It was sound advice. Turns out “odd plants” was just that: a collection of herbs and greens grown or foraged in the mountains. I no longer recall what kind, but I do remember they were nothing especially fancy. Skilled, intentional plating made the humble assortment of leaves, stalks and even
tiny flowers look regal. They were served with an addictive white anchovy dipping sauce.
It was such a simple thing, this modest little dish. Yet it undid me — the greenness; the individual flavor notes of each plant singing with terroir; the unobtrusive yet superb condiment to be added or ignored at the diner’s whim. I’ve never forgotten it, and in the years since, I’ve realized that it totally uprooted and transformed my previous ideas about the art and craft of food.
To the deep sorrow of Asheville, Canipelli died suddenly on Feb. 6 at the too-young age of 46 while on the line at Cucina 24. He had been honored as a StarChefs Rising Star Chef in 2013 and was a 2016 semifinalist for the James Beard Foundation’s Best Chef: Southeast award.
But whether serving burgers from a food trailer at Burial Beer Co., painstakingly developing a Basque-inspired menu to open Burial’s Forestry Camp
restaurant or offering a cozy, Italian wine/antipasto/pizza experience at Contrada — all things Canipelli did along with opening his Italy-meetsAppalachia concept, Cucina 24, in 2008 — the chef quietly impressed with his culinary deftness as well as his kindness and humanity.
In the days since his death, fans and friends from the Asheville community and beyond haven’t been shy in their collective outpouring of grief over the loss of both the chef and his cuisine. James Beard Award-winning chef Katie Button remembered past birthday meals Canipelli had prepared for her, praising him as one of the best chefs she’s ever known.
“But his talents as a chef aren’t the things that will stick with me, or the thing that I keep thinking about since he passed,” she wrote on social media. “It’s how he made me feel when I was around him.”
Food writer and longtime local service industry worker Jonathan Ammons wrote eloquently in social media posts of carefully executed, globally themed dinners Canipelli used to regularly host for Asheville restaurant employees. He admired the chef’s dedication to supporting and uplifting the service community.
Ammons also detailed Canipelli’s culinary brilliance, curiosity and work ethic — “an obsession with process, technique, thoughts, ideas,” he wrote. “No matter how strange the process, it was worth the effort for Brian just to know what it was like.”
Canipelli had a motto, Ammons says, that perfectly summed up his ethos as a restaurateur: “Always make it worth more than they are paying for it.”
My odd plants experience definitely fits that description. As does, I would venture, a meal local artist Paul Choi described as one of his “top three personal food stories” in a recent Xpress letter to the editor. Many years ago, Choi remembers, he was walking downtown when he ran into the chef, who urged him to stop by Cucina 24 that evening because he’d scored some coveted white truffles from Alba, Italy. Wisely, Choi adjusted his dinner plans accordingly.
FAREWELL TO THE CHEF: Asheville is mourning the Feb. 6 death of Cucina 24 and Contrada chef Brian Canipelli, pictured here before the opening of Burial Beer Co.’s Forestry Camp in 2019. Photo by Morgan Ford
Sitting at the restaurant’s bar overlooking the open kitchen, Choi watched the chef toss the pasta for his main dish. “He plates it and the entire kitchen staff surrounds him and watches as he pulls out a truffle and shaves an ungodly amount on the pasta, making it rain from above his head,” Choi recalls.
“He then walks the dish towards me, and when he was about 6 feet away, a wall of pugilistic pungency hit me in the face. My eyes watered from the smell. I thanked him as he set the dish down. That first bite was a penetrating flood of delicious truffle and butter and garlic and pasta flavors. … It was one of the most intense food moments I’ve ever had.” For that evening’s unforgettable experience, Choi says, his bill was a whopping $20. (Read the full letter at mountainx.com.)
Thank you, chef, for giving Asheville so many meals and memories worth so very much more than we paid. X
Celebrating the chef
A public event honoring the memory of chef Brian Canipelli will be held 2-5 p.m. Sunday, Feb. 23, at New Belgium Brewery, 21 Craven St. Remarks will be offered on the taproom’s deck at 3 p.m. X
Preserving history
New photography book documents Black experiences in Appalachia jmcguire@mountainx.com
BY JUSTIN M c GUIRE
A native of St. Matthews, S.C., Chris Aluka Berry spent many hours hiking and camping in Western North Carolina and other parts of Appalachia growing up.
“But outside of the urban areas like Asheville, I never saw Black folks when I went into the mountains,” says Berry, whose mother is Black and father is white.
So he was surprised when a friend relayed a story that only hinted at the broad spectrum of African American experiences in the region over the centuries. “She had a Black girlfriend whose grandmother was from the north Georgia mountains who would work with different folk remedies, with the plants and different things,” he recalls. “It’s just something I did not know about.”
That conversation spurred Berry, an award-winning freelance photographer, to spend six years visiting Black communities in WNC, northeast Georgia and eastern Tennessee.
“I wasn’t getting paid to do this,” says Berry, who lived outside Atlanta during the six years he was taking the photos. “There were many times I slept in my car or slept at people’s homes. People would call me and invite me to funerals. People would call me and invite me to homecoming events or family gatherings. Every month or two, I was coming up to the mountains.”
The result is Affrilachia: Testimonies, a book of photographs taken at churches, homes, revival services, family gatherings and more. The book also includes oral histories, historic photos and more.
“Affrilachia,” a term coined in 1991 by Kentucky poet Frank X Walker, refers to the cultural contributions of African Americans who live in the region.
Xpress spoke with Berry, who now lives in Marshall, about how the book came together, what communities he visited and why the story of Affrilachia is important.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Xpress: How did you go about finding the communities to write about?
Berry: It was going kind of slow, and then this woman named Marie Cochran, who started the Affrilachian Artist Project, randomly got word
that I was trying to document life in the Black communities. She knew folks at Mount Zion AME Church in Cullowhee. She talked to the pastor, asked him if I could come photograph the Easter Sunday service in 2016.
When I showed up that day, very few people attended, and everyone told me, “You’ve got to meet the matriarch, May Louise Allen.” I did, and I asked her if I could come back in about a month to do some oral histories and just spend time photographing her life, telling her story, and she said yes. Then I got a phone call about 19 days later that she had passed away. And when I was at the church service, everyone told me, “Oh man, you should have been here 50 years ago. There used to be a thriving Black community here.”
I’m not trying to re-create the past, but I just thought I’ve got to try and preserve these histories while they’re still here. So that really lit a fire under me.
Normally when I went to a new community, I would start at the church. Because in the Black communities, the church historically in the mountains has been a place of refuge. And it’s also like the local community center. I’d always start with the elders and I would interview them.
Tell us a little about the communities you spotlighted.
I focused on three main things in the book. We tell the story of the Rock Springs Camp Meeting in White County, Ga., which has been going on
since 1886. We also tell a story in east Tennessee about the Pierce family. And then in North Carolina, we tell the story of Texana [an unincorporated area in Cherokee County].
There was a young girl named Texas McClellan, and the way we understand it through the oral histories and the research that we went through, is that her family was a mixed-race family, Black, Cherokee and Irish. They were living on Cherokee land and were being forced off. We think it was due to racial pressure from the white folks. So Texas and a friend, they scouted a new location for the community to move to. It was this hilltop just outside of Murphy, and it became a pretty self-sufficient community during the Jim Crow era.
Other than Cullowhee and Texana, what WNC communities are in the book?
You have Sylva in Jackson County. There’s a little bit from Waynesville. There used to be a really large Black community in Madison County. I have found some really great historical photographs in Madison County, because the book also includes historical photographs, many of which have never been viewed by the public. These are photos that were hanging on people’s walls or in their photo albums. And there’s a little bit of documentation from the Hillside community in Weaverville.
Why is telling the story of Black people in this region important?
This is something that needs to be preserved. This is a part of history and culture, and I am real big into representation. I’m tired of all the bulls**t of people just representing Black people in the same tired way. When I started to find out about these Black communities and spend time in them, I was like, “Wow, man, this does not play into any of the stereotypes I’ve ever heard.” This does not play into what a lot of people think of Appalachia, especially if they’ve never been here. They think about the poverty porn, and they think about all of the photos of poor, uneducated white people. Then you start to find out that it’s so much more than that. This is a time where we need to get past all of this racial stuff and really see each other as people and look past our skin and change those stereotypes. I’m just one little photographer that brought some people together. But the book is a glimpse that can maybe help to change the stereotype of Appalachia.
Berry will discuss the book Wednesday, Feb. 26, 3-4:30 p.m., at Cashiers Community Library and Thursday, Feb. 25, 4-5:30 p.m., at the Madison County Public Library in Marshall. Historian Maia A. Surdam will be at the Marshall event. For more information, go to avl.mx/ejm. X
CAPTURING HISTORY: Photographer Chris Aluka Berry spent six years documenting the lives of Black people in Appalachia. Photo courtesy of Berry
Magical Offerings
2/19: Reader: Jessica 12-5 Women’s Circle w/ Ally
2/20: Reader: Alondra 1-6 SUN MOVES INTO PISCES
2/21: Reader: Krysta 12-6
2/22: Reader: Edward 12-6
2/23: Reader: Andrea 12-4
Recovering together
BY CHRISTOPHER ARBOR
On Jan. 1, Christopher Arbor and his friends launched a quest to visit one Asheville brewery each week for all of 2025 in the order that they opened then share the experience with Mountain Xpress readers. Read about their previous outing at Thirsty Monk Brewery at avl.mx/ejt.
For a while, this winter felt like Russian literature: cold, bleak and endless. Then the pendulum swung in the other direction to an unseasonably mild February evening, so I texted my friends to meet me at the original Wedge Brewing Co. location. When I say, “Jump,” they say, “Tomahta.”
We arrived in jovial moods, happy to be outside, among friends and on the left side of the tracks. Bartender Joe Sisti has served me so many pints over the years that we’re on a first-name basis. He poured our crew a pitcher of Wedge’s tasty Iron Rail IPA — it’s somewhere between Green Man Brewery’s British IPA and the hoppier American varieties. The compelling tap handles, I learned, were made by another bartender, local artist Aaron Iaquinto
I love Iron Rail, but my go-to Wedge beer is AOB stout. Wedge’s website says, “No milkshakes or candy bars were used in brewing this beer. Just pure unadulterated roasted malt.” To me, it’s like drinking a loaf of bread, and I love it.
Wedge brews AOB for the annual Spring Out community bicycling event hosted by Asheville on Bikes, a nonprofit founded by former Wedge bartender Mike Sule. “Because so
many riders come in, we often offer the beer year-round,” says Wedge General Manager Lucious Wilson
Perhaps more than anything else, the night made me feel hopeful. Of the breweries we’ve visited this year, Wedge is the first to have recovered after being engulfed in floodwaters from Tropical Storm Helene.
Joe tells me the water was knee high in the taproom; however, none of the brewing equipment was damaged nor were the brews contaminated. With some luck and a heckuva lot of hard work, the brewery reopened this loca-
tion on Halloween, just a month after the storm.
Wedge has two other locations. The one downtown in the Grove Arcade is doing fine, but the one on Foundy Street was completely submerged in water during Helene. Owner Tim Schaller isn’t one to quit, though. Lucious says Schaller plans to reopen the Foundy Street taproom this fall, though “there are many hurdles to navigate before that is definitive,” he notes.
I’m mighty grateful for Schaller’s tenacity. That location is among my favorite spots in Asheville.
Wedge opened in the River Arts District (RAD) in 2008, when the modern RAD was something of a toddler. Now it feels more like a runner struggling to recover from a major injury. The greenway that still felt new to me before Helene is in mighty rough shape, with many businesses and art studios wrecked and chunks of the dog park washed downstream. Still, that night I had confidence that we can handle the recovery. Together.
• Feb. 19 – Oyster House Brewing on Haywood Road
• Feb. 26 – Wicked Weed Brewing’s downtown brewpub Join us if you’d like. Email me at yearinbeerasheville@gmail.com or just show up. X
TOP OF THE TAPS: Wedge bartender Joe Sisti is pictured at the brewery’s original River Arts District location. The bar’s custom tap handles were created by another bartender, local artist Aaron Iaquinto. Photo by Christopher Arbor
Accepting New Patients
Table talk
Scholar discusses Black women, food and power in the South
BY KAY WEST
kswest55@comcast.net
Psyche Williams-Forson will close out UNC Asheville’s lecture series, Diverse Roots at the Common Table: Culinary Conversations in the American South on Wednesday, Feb. 26. But Williams-Forson — author, professor and chair of the department of American studies at the University of Maryland College Park — promises not to lecture. Instead, she intends to host an interactive conversation about how women have always managed to use food to procure everything from pin money to houses.
Williams-Forson’s discussion, “When We Go Meet the Trains: Black Women, Food and Power in the American South,” grew from her doctoral thesis, which became her first book, Building Houses Out of Chicken Legs. She later penned Eating While Black: Food Shaming and Race in America, which won a 2023 James Beard Media Award.
She became interested in food as a category of analysis as a graduate research assistant at the University of Maryland for Jewish scholar Hasia Diner, author of Hungering for America: Italian, Irish, and Jewish Foodways in the Age of Migration. “I was beginning my graduate studies and wasn’t familiar with the term ‘foodways,’” Williams-Forson recalls.
Curiosity piqued, she looked it up and was directed to a listing of cookbooks by three noted Black women — Jessica Harris, Vertamae Smart-Grosvener and Edna Lewis. “The cookbooks tell what Black people eat, but not why,” Williams-Forson says. “That started me in my graduate career trying to understand Black food culture.”
Three public incidents connecting famous Black men — Tiger Woods, Martin Luther King, Jr. and Barack Obama — with fried chicken inspired her to study how racist stereotypes around that food came to be. While poring over archives at the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Beltsville Agricultural Research Center, she discovered an article that changed the direction of her study.
“It was the story of a group of Black women in Gordonsville, Va., in the late 1880s who fried chicken, took it to the train station and sold it to passengers
WOMEN’S BUSINESS: An interactive conversation with professor and author Psyche Williams-Forson wraps up UNC Asheville’s Diverse Roots at the Common Table lecture series. Kevin Harris Photography
through the windows of the cars,” Williams-Forson explains. “It was a very organized and multigenerational enterprise that allowed these women to put their children through school, buy property and open businesses.”
The title of Williams-Forson’s first book comes from a quote by a chicken vendor interviewed for Gordonsville’s sesquicentennial. “This woman said, ‘My mother built our house out of chicken legs; the first one burned down, and she rebuilt it,’” the author says.
“These particular cultural moments are unparalleled,” she continues. “You see an intersection of labor, enterprise, artistry and culinary expertise. It is important to remember there was a time when this is how these women made a living. We have to be able to hold those memories for posterity.” X
WHAT
“When We Go Meet the Trains: Black Women, Food and Power in the American South” WHERE Blue Ridge Room at Highsmith Student Union; preregister at avl.mx/ejc WHEN Wednesday, Feb. 26, 6-7:30 p.m.
The Asheville Brewers Alliance (ABA), along with partners FIRC Group and the Asheville Area Food Guild, have rescheduled the arts, craft beverage and mac-and-cheese festival, For the Love Craft, to Saturday, May 17. A fundraiser to support restaurants, breweries and artists impacted by Tropical Storm Helene, the festival was originally scheduled for Saturday, Feb. 22. The festival’s new date allows it to be part of AVL Beer Week festivities, says ABA Executive Director Karis Roberts. “Given the increased
spring tourism and the strong regional support surrounding the 14th anniversary of AVL Beer Week, we believe this timing will allow us to create a more impactful and engaging experience,” Roberts said in an email to event vendors. She also cited low ticket sales and a “noticeable decline in both tourism and local participation” as reasons for the change. For the Love of Craft will be held at Battery Park Hall, 1 Battery Park Ave. downtown. Ticket sales and vendor registration remain open. For tickets, visit avl.mx/ej7. X
From fancy dinners to cannabis edibles, local food writer and social media personality Stu Helm released his annual list of favorite Asheville dishes and dining experiences, the 12th annual Food Fan Awards, in early February. Along with honoring culinary achievement, this year’s awards — also known as the Stoobies — lean into recognizing local businesses that have gone above and beyond to help the community in the aftermath of Tropical Storm Helene. Find the list of winners at avl.mx/eja. X
Cheers to second chances. For those who missed out on Asheville Restaurant Week’s annual gift of local restaurant deals and discounts in January, Asheville Area Chamber of Commerce is offering Round 2 this year through Monday, Feb. 24. Dozens of Asheville eateries are participating with special prix fixe menus and discounted dishes. For a list of restaurants and deals, visit avl.mx/5k3. X
Wine by the Vines at Gemelli
Gemelli continues its ongoing Wine by the Vines dinner series the third and fourth Thursdays of each month, highlighting cuisines around the globe. The Feb. 20 and 27 fivecourse dinners spotlight the flavors and wines of France’s Burgundy region, including the beloved beaujolais. March 20 and 27 showcase iconic American dishes paired with approachable wines. Seating is communal. Vegetarian and gluten-free meals can be provided with notice. Tickets are $75 each. Gemelli is at 70 Westgate Parkway. For tickets, visit avl.mx/ej9. X
Grants for MANNA FoodBank
In early February, Western North Carolina food distribution hub MANNA FoodBank announced that it received a total of $7 million in grants, $3.5 each from the Community Foundation of Western North Carolina and the N.C. Community Foundation, for infrastructure and recovery efforts in the wake of Tropical Storm Helene. The money will support buildout of a 15,000-square-foot freezer and refrigerator facility, a sprinkler system, generator, storage racks and more for the new 84,000-square-foot Mills River warehouse the nonprofit acquired immediately after its former Swannanoa River Road facility was destroyed by flooding from Helene. MANNA foresees 12-18 months of buildout while continuing its disaster response efforts across 16 WNC counties, according to a press release from the organization. To learn more about MANNA, visit avl.mx/ejb. X
Jargon will host a five-course wine dinner in its Argot Room at 6 p.m. on Monday, Feb. 24, featuring vintages from Davis Family Vineyards. Winemaker Guy Davis will share stories from his California and Highlands, N.C., winery locations, accompanied by a special guest, cacao chocolatier Melody Germain of Sylva-based La La Land Organics. Tickets for the community-style meal with wine pairings are $150 per person. Jargon’s Argot Room is at 717 Haywood Road. For tickets, visit avl.mx/ej8. X
Photo courtesy of MANNA
SMART BETS
by Kay West |
The Photography of Andrea Clark Historic Home Tour
Much of Asheville’s original East End neighborhood, once a center of Black residential and professional life, was destroyed by the city’s urban renewal policies between the 1960s and early 1990s. Before it was erased, local photographer Andrea Clark captured over 200 images of the community’s landscape, buildings and people. The second part of an exhibit of these photos, The Photography of Andrea Clark: Remembering Asheville’s East End Community, opened at the Asheville Museum of History on Feb. 12 and continues through the end of May. Clark was born and raised in Massachusetts, where she studied photography. In the 1960s, she moved to Asheville to live with
her father. She is the granddaughter of influential Asheville master brick mason James Vester Miller. The museum will also celebrate Black History Month with two other offerings. The free Community Day event, on Saturday, Feb. 22, 11 a.m.-5 p.m., will include children’s activities and an 11:30 a.m. program with YMI Cultural Center Executive Director the Rev. Sean Hasker Palmer on the history of the YMI. On Tuesday, Feb. 25, 6-7 p.m., painter LaKisha Blount will present Echoes of Texana: The Families That Made It a Community , exploring the historically Black town of Texana in Cherokee County, founded by Blount’s ancestor, Texana McClelland. avl.mx/ejg X
Turn back the hands of time with a peek inside some of Asheville’s most lovingly preserved and authentically renovated residences at the Preservation Society of Asheville and Buncombe County’s (PSABC) annual Historic Home Tour. On Saturday-Sunday, Feb. 22-23, 1-5 p.m., ticket holders can stroll the streets of the Chestnut Hill Historic District just north of downtown, meandering at their own pace through four neighboring private homes built on North Liberty Street between 1890 and 1923. The homes on the tour represent architectural designs such as Queen Anne and Colonial Revival. Renowned local architects
J.A. Tennent and Richard Sharp Smith were among those who built in the Chestnut Hill neighborhood during that era, when rail access had opened Asheville to tourism and investment. The tour includes a bonus stop at the Beaufort House Inn, also on North Liberty. Volunteers will be on hand at each stop to answer questions. Dress for the weather, as the event happens rain or shine. Attendees must be able to navigate sidewalks and stairs. Tickets are $50 each. Preservation Society members and Buncombe County residents receive a $15 discount by using the code “PSABC” when registering. avl.mx/ej5 X
Looking Down Eagle Street 1970-71 by Andrea Clark
Photo of home at 85 North Liberty St. courtesy of PSABC
Palestinian Film Festival
Every picture tells a story, and the full-length films and shorts that will be screened at the Sumud Collective’s Palestinian Film Festival on Saturday, Feb. 23, will help tell the myriad stories of Palestinian resistance. The Sumud Collective is a Western North Carolina-based group dedicated to solidarity with Palestinians against occupation. Organizers say the six films to be screened — The Present , Hebron , Tale of Three Jewels , The Painting , Foragers and The Time That Remains — are appropriate for middle-school-age youths and
older. Activities are planned for younger children. Beyond the films, there will be tabling from community organizations and Q&A opportunities with directors and local Palestinian liberation activists. Palestinian food is included in the $15-$40 sliding-scale ticket price (no one will be turned away for lack of funds). Proceeds from the event will be used to help Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza. Doors open at 11 a.m. with screenings and activities running until 9 p.m. at the El Porvenir Cultural Center, 17 Westside Drive. avl.mx/ejl X
February 21st - 23rd
The Omni Grove park Inn 8th & 10th floor, Vanderbilt Wing Early 20th Century Antiques (1895 - 1939) & contemporary art inspired by the Arts & Crafts Movement for purchase.
Feb. 23rd 11am-4pm
WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 19
27 CLUB
Bad Ties (trip-hop, alternative, spoken-word), 9pm
FLEETWOOD'S
PSK Karaoke, 8pm
GRANGE BY FOOTHILLS Trivia Night, 6pm
HI-WIRE BREWING -
BILTMORE VILLAGE
Free Weekly Trivia, 7pm
JACK OF THE WOOD PUB
Old Time Jam, 5pm
OKLAWAHA
BREWING CO.
Bluegrass Jam w/Derek McCoy & Friends, 6pm
PISGAH BREWING CO.
High Top Boys (bluegrass, folk), 6pm
SLY GROG LOUNGE
Weird Wednesday Open Jam, 8pm
SOUTHERN
APPALACHIAN BREWERY
Jazz Night, 6pm
STATIC AGE RECORDS
Tall Juan w/Sounding Arrow (punk, psychedelic, folk-rock), 8pm
THE GREY EAGLE
Uncle Lucius w/Cole
Phillips (country, rock, Americana), 8pm
THE MULE
Trivia w/Party Grampa, 6:30pm
THE ODD
Terraoke Karaoke Takeover, 9pm
THE ONE STOP
Alex Bradley & Friends (funk, soul, jazz), 10pm
VOODOO BREWING CO.
Comedy Night w/Hey There Comedy, 7pm
WHITE HORSE BLACK MOUNTAIN
Straight Ahead Wednesdays w/The Brian Felix Trio (jazz), 7:30pm
THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 20
27 CLUB
Hysteria w/DJ Doktor C*nty & DJ Alien Hex
Friend (goth, darkwave), 9pm
ASHEVILLE MUSIC
HALL
Bearly Dead (tribute-band), 8pm
BOTANIST & BARREL
TASTING BAR + BOTTLE SHOP
Oh! Comedy Show, 6:30pm
CROW & QUILL
Matadragones (Latin, Americana), 8pm
EDA RHYNE
DISTILLERY & TASTING ROOM
The Gilded Palace of Metamodern Sounds, 6pm
EDA'S HIDE-A-WAY
Bless Your Heart Trivia w/Harmon, 7pm
EULOGY
Stealing the Covers: Night 1 (multi-genre), 7pm
FLOOD GALLERY
True Home Open Mic, 6pm
HIGHLAND BREWING
CO.
Nordmoe & The Rodeo (country), 6pm
JACK OF THE WOOD PUB
Bluegrass Jam w/Drew Matulich, 7pm
LEVELLER BREWING CO.
Open Old Time Jam, 6pm
LOOKOUT BREWING CO.
Music Bingo w/DJ Spence, 6pm
OKLAWAHA BREWING CO.
Kid Billy (blues, jazz, folk), 7pm
ONE WORLD
BREWING
Musical Happy Hour, 5pm
CLUBLAND
A TOUCH OF BAYOU SOUL: On Sunday, Feb. 23, Louisiana-based singer-songwriter Marc Broussard plays at The Orange Peel, starting at 7:30 p.m. Broussard will bring his unique style — perhaps best described as bayou soul — which is a mix of funk, blues, R&B, rock and more. Photo courtesy of Jeff Fasano
ONE WORLD BREWING WEST
Fee Fi Phaux Fish (Phish tribute), 8pm
PULP
Sold Out: Marc Maron (comedy), 8pm
PISGAH BREWING CO.
Asheville Guitar Tribute to Jeff Beck (funk-rock, jazz-fusion), 6:30pm
SHAKEY'S
• Comedy Showcase w/ Hilliary Begley, 8pm
• Karaoke w/DJ Franco Nino, 9pm
SLY GROG LOUNGE
Sex Mex (punk), 8pm
STATIC AGE LOFT
Auto-Tune Karaoke w/ Who Gave This B*tch A Mic, 10pm
THE ONE STOP
Andrew Thelston Band (rock, alternative), 9pm
VOWL Karaoke Night, 8pm
WHITE HORSE BLACK MOUNTAIN
Rick Price (soft-rock, folk), 7:30pm
FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 21
CATAWBA BREWING CO. SOUTH SLOPE ASHEVILLE
Comedy at Catawba: Liam Nelson, 7pm
CORDUROY LOUNGE
Moon Bride & Arielita (indie-pop), 8pm
CORK & KEG
Zydeco Ya Ya (Cajun, Zydeco), 8pm
CROW & QUILL
Vaden Landers (country, folk, Americana), 8pm
EULOGY
Stealing the Covers: Night 2 (multi-genre), 7pm
HIGHLAND BREWING CO.
The Explorers Club (pop-rock), 6pm
JACK OF THE WOOD PUB Gold Rose (Americana, alt-country), 8pm
LOOKOUT BREWING CO.
Friday Night Music Series, 6pm
OKLAWAHA BREWING CO.
Raphael Graves Band (Americana, folk, soul), 8pm
ONE WORLD
BREWING
Vice Versa (jazz, funk, pop), 8pm
ONE WORLD
BREWING WEST
Breakfast for Dinner (soul, indie-pop), 7pm
ORANGE PEEL
Michael Marcagi w/Ashley Kutcher (Americana, alternative), 8pm
SHAKEY'S Big Blue Jams Band (multi-genre), 9pm
SIERRA NEVADA BREWING CO.
The Get Right Band (psych, indie-rock), 6:30pm
SLY GROG LOUNGE
Hashwitch, The White Horse, Once Below Joy, & Human Urgency (stoner-metal, progrock), 8pm
STATIC AGE RECORDS
Sunbearer, Dead Runes & Lore (stoner-rock, rock'n'roll, psych), 9pm
THE GREY EAGLE
54 Bicycles: Widespread Panic Preservation (tribute-band), 8pm THE ODD Prosperity Gospel, Serrate, Halogi, Madder Max (black-metal, power-metal, punk), 8pm
THE ONE STOP Krispee Biscuits & Kaptain w/special guests (electronic, funk), 10pm
THE STATION BLACK
MOUNTAIN
Mr Jimmy (blues), 5pm
THIRD ROOM Phuncle Sam (tribute-band), 8pm
TORGUA BREWING
The Candleers (country), 5pm
URBAN ORCHARD Throwback Fridays, 9pm
WHITE HORSE BLACK MOUNTAIN Even Cowgirls Get The Blues (country, blues), 7:30pm
SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 22
ASHEVILLE CLUB
Mr Jimmy (blues), 6pm
ASHEVILLE MUSIC HALL Lime Cordiale (pop, surf-rock, alternative), 8pm
BATTERY PARK BOOK EXCHANGE
Dinah's Daydream (jazz), 5:30pm
CATAWBA BREWING
CO. SOUTH SLOPE
ASHEVILLE Cali Sober: A Non-Alcoholic Comedy Show, 6pm
CORDUROY LOUNGE
Dance Party w/Merrick Noyes, 8pm
CROW & QUILL
Firecracker Jazz Band (swing, dixieland), 8pm
EULOGY
Hi-Vi Sound System
5-Year Anniversary (electronic, hip-hop),
CLUBLAND
FLEETWOOD'S Starseer, John Kirby Jr. and the New Seniors, & Mahto and the Loose Balloons (rock, alternative), 9pm
DiTrani Brothers, The Bandit Queen of Sorrows & Black Sea Beat Society (Balkan, dark-folk, Turkish), 8pm
THE GREY EAGLE
Brennan Edwards w/ Colby T Helms (country, folk), 8pm
THIRD ROOM
Open Decks, 8pm
VOODOO BREWING CO.
Trivia Tuesday w/ Principal Mike, 7pm
WHITE HORSE BLACK MOUNTAIN
White Horse's Open Mic, 7pm
WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 26
GRANGE BY FOOTHILLS
Trivia Night, 6pm
HI-WIRE BREWING -
BILTMORE VILLAGE
Free Weekly Trivia, 7pm
HIGHLAND BREWING CO.
Hear Here w/Amanda Anne Platt & the Honeycutters (country, folk), 6pm
JACK OF THE WOOD PUB
Old Time Jam, 5pm
OKLAWAHA BREWING CO.
Bluegrass Jam w/Derek McCoy & Friends, 6pm
ORANGE PEEL
Bryce Vine w/Jayo (hiphop, alternative), 8pm
PISGAH BREWING CO.
David Matters & Life
Like Water (Appalachia, Africa), 6pm
SLY GROG LOUNGE
Weird Wednesday Open Jam, 7pm
SOUTHERN
APPALACHIAN BREWERY
Jazz Night, 6pm
THE MULE
Trivia w/Party Grampa, 6:30pm
THE ODD
Terraoke Karaoke Takeover, 9pm
THE ONE STOP
The Big Town Getdown (funk, jazz, pop), 10pm
VOODOO BREWING
CO.
Music Bingo Thursdays, 7pm
WHITE HORSE BLACK MOUNTAIN
Melissa McKinney's Bad Ass Blues Jam, 7:30pm
THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 27
CATAWBA BREWING CO. SOUTH SLOPE
ASHEVILLE
Comedy at Catawba: Asheville Cat Ladies, 7pm
CROW & QUILL
Matadragones (Latin, Americana), 8pm
EDA RHYNE
DISTILLERY & TASTING ROOM
The Gilded Palace of Metamodern Sounds, 6pm
EDA'S HIDE-A-WAY
Bless Your Heart Trivia w/Harmon, 7pm
EULOGY
Poison Ruïn, Béton
Armé, & On the Block, 8pm
FLEETWOOD'S Hotel Hugo, Paprika, & East Ritual (indie-rock, garage), 9pm
HIGHLAND BREWING CO.
The Knockin' Boots (country), 6pm
JACK OF THE WOOD PUB
Bluegrass Jam w/Drew Matulich, 7pm
LEVELLER BREWING CO.
Irish Session, 6pm
LOOKOUT BREWING CO.
Music Bingo w/DJ Spence, 6pm
ONE WORLD BREWING
Musical Happy Hour, 5pm
ONE WORLD
BREWING WEST
Fee Fi Phaux Fish (Phish tribute), 8pm
ORANGE PEEL
Niko Moon w/ David J (country, pop), 8pm
PISGAH BREWING CO.
Bald Mountain Boys (bluegrass), 6:30pm
SHAKEY'S Karaoke w/Franco Nino, 9pm
THE GREY EAGLE Satsang w/Sierra Marin (folk-pop, reggae, hip-hop), 8pm
VOWL Karaoke Night, 8pm WICKED WEED WEST Paul Edelman (roots, rock, folk), 5:30pm
FREEWILL ASTROLOGY BY ROB BREZSNY
ARIES (March 21-April 19): The Hindu holiday of Maha Shivaratri is dedicated to overcoming ignorance and darkness in celebrants’ own lives and in the world. This year it falls on Feb. 26. Even if you’re not Hindu, I recommend you observe your own personal version of it. To do so would be in accordance with astrological omens. They suggest that the coming weeks will be an excellent time for you to be introspective, study your life and history, and initiate changes that will dispel any emotional or spiritual blindness you might be suffering from. P.S.: Remember that not all darkness is bad! But some is unhealthy and demoralizing and that’s the kind you should banish and transmute.
TAURUS (April 20-May 20): The blue whale is the most massive animal that has ever lived. You could swim through its arteries. Its heart is five feet high and weighs 400 pounds. And yet, when diving, its pulse slows to four to eight times per minute. I propose we choose the blue whale to be your spirit creature in the coming weeks. May this magnificent beast inspire you to cultivate slow, potent rhythms that serve you better than hyperactivity. Let’s assume you will accomplish all you need by maintaining a steady, measured pace — by focusing on projects that require depth and diligence rather than speed. Your natural persistence will enable you to tackle tasks that might overwhelm those who lack your patience.
GEMINI (May 21-June 20): Over 10,000 years ago, someone walked for a mile through what’s now White Sands National Park in New Mexico. We know they did because they left footprints that were fossilized. Scientists believe it was probably a woman who mostly carried a child and sometimes let the child walk under its own power. Like those ancient footprints, your actions in the coming weeks may carry lasting significance — more than may be immediately apparent. I encourage you to proceed as if you are making a more substantial impact and having a bigger influence than you imagine.
CANCER (June 21-July 22): What’s the oldest known recipe? What ancient food product did our ancestors write down instructions about how to make? It was beer! The 4,000-year-old Sumerian text included a hymn to Ninkasi, the goddess of beer. It tells how to use the right ingredients and employ careful fermentation to concoct a beverage that lowers inhibitions and brings people together in convivial celebration. In that spirit, Cancerian, I encourage you to meditate on the elements you can call on to create merrymaking and connection. Now is a good time to approach this holy task with extra focus and purposefulness.
LEO (July 23-Aug. 22): In November 1963, the captain of a sardine boat sailing near Iceland noticed a column of dark smoke rising out of the water. Was it another boat on fire? No, it was the beginning of a volcanic eruption. A few days later, steady explosions had created a new island, Surtsey, which still exists today. I suspect you will have a metaphorically comparable power in the coming weeks, Leo: an ability to generate a new creation out of fervent energies rising out of the hot depths. Be alert! And be ready to harness and make constructive use of the primal force.
VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22): Harald “Bluetooth” Gormsson was a 10th-century Danish king. He united the tribes of Denmark into a single kingdom. His nickname originated in the fact that he had a prominent dead tooth that turned bluishgray. More than 10 centuries later, engineers who created a new short-range wireless technology decided to call their invention “bluetooth.” Why? Because they imagined it would serve a variety of electronic devices, just as the king once blended the many tribes. In the spirit of these bluetooth phenomena, I’m urging you Virgos to be a uniter in the coming weeks and months. You will have an enhanced capacity to bridge different worlds and link disparate groups. P.S.: An aspect that could
be construed as an imperfection, like Harald’s tooth, could conceal or signify a strength.
LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22): Libran author Ursula K. Le Guin wrote, “Freedom is a heavy load, a great and strange burden for the spirit to undertake.” I know from experience there’s truth in that idea. But I’m happy to tell you that in 2025, freedom will be less heavy and less burdensome than maybe ever before in your life. In fact, I suspect liberation will be relatively smooth and straightforward for you. It won’t be rife with complications and demands, but will be mostly fun and pleasurable. Having said that, I do foresee a brief phase when working on freedom will be a bit more arduous: the next few weeks. The good news is that your emancipatory efforts will set the stage for more ease during the rest of 2025.
SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21): Always and forever, the world is a delicate balance of seemingly opposing forces that are in fact interwoven and complementary: light and shadow, determination and surrender, ascent and descent, fullness and emptiness, progress and integration, yes and no. The apparent polarities need and feed each other. In the coming weeks, I invite you to meditate on these themes. Are there areas of your life where you have been overly focused on one side of the scale while neglecting the other? If so, consider the possibility of recalibrating. Whether you are balancing emotion with logic, rest with work, or connection with independence, take time to adjust. If you honor both halves of each whole, you will generate fertile harmonies.
SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21): The ancient stands of cedar trees on Japan’s Yakushima Island have a special power. They create weather patterns for themselves, generating rain clouds from the water vapor they release through their leaves. This ingenious stroke of self-nurturing provides them with the exact rainfall they require. I propose that we make these cedar trees your power symbol in the coming weeks. It’s an excellent time for you to dream up and implement more of the conditions you need to flourish.
CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19): Tardigrades are tiny, eight-legged animals colloquially known as water bears or moss piglets. Their resilience is legendary. They can thrive anywhere, from mountaintops to the deep sea, from Antarctica to tropical rainforests. They can withstand extreme temperatures, live a long time without water, and even survive in outer space. I propose we make the tardigrade your power creature for the coming weeks, dear Capricorn. Your flexibility and fluidity will be at a peak. You will be hardy, supple, and durable. It will be a favorable time to leave your comfort zone and test your mettle in new environments. Seemingly improbable challenges may be well within your range of adaptability.
AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18): In the coming days, playing games could be good practice for life. Breezy exchanges and fun activities could stimulate clues and insights that will be useful in making important decisions. What appears to be ordinary entertainment or social engagement may provide you with profound lessons about strategy and timing. How you manage cooperation and competition in those lighter moments could yield useful guidance about more serious matters.
PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20): Have you been struggling to summon the motivation to start anew in some area of your life? I predict that sometime in the coming weeks, you will find all the motivation you need. Have you been wishing you could shed the weight of the past and glide into a fresh project with unburdened mind and heart? I believe that destiny will soon conspire to assist you in this noble hope. Are you finally ready to exorcise a pesky ghost and dash jubilantly toward the horizon, eager to embrace your future? I think you are.
MARKETPLACE
Want to advertise in Marketplace? 828-251-1333 advertise@mountainx.com • mountainx.com/classifieds
If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is. Remember the Russian proverb: “Doveryai, no proveryai,” trust but verify. When answering classified ads, always err on the side of caution. Especially beware of any party asking you to give them financial or identification information. The Mountain Xpress cannot be responsible for ensuring that each advertising client is legitimate. Please report scams to advertise@mountainx.com
EMPLOYMENT
PROFESSIONAL/ MANAGEMENT
ONTRACK WNC IS HIRING AN EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR!
OnTrack WNC is on the hunt for a dynamic and team-oriented community leader to step into the role of Executive Director! To apply, head over to our website: ontrackwnc. org/were-hiring/ emilyr@ ontrackwnc.org
HOME IMPROVEMENT
GENERAL SERVICES
AVL'S PREMIER EXTERIOR CLEANING SERVICE Maintaining your property
is important for its longevity and curb appeal. JD Power Washing provides safe soft washing for your house, driveway, deck, and more. jd@jd-power-washing.com
HANDY MAN
HANDY MAN 40 years experience in the trades, with every skill/tool imaginable for all trades with the exception of HVAC. No job too small. $40 an hour. Carl (828) 551-6000 electricblustudio@gmail. com
ANNOUNCEMENTS
ANNOUNCEMENTS
AFFORDABLE TV & INTERNET If you are overpaying for your service, call now for a free quote and see how much you can save! 1-844-588-6579 . (AAN CAN)
AGING ROOF? NEW HOMEOWNER? STORM DAMAGE? You need a local expert provider that proudly stands behind their work. Fast, free estimate. Financing available. Call 1-888-292-8225 (AAN CAN)
BATH & SHOWER
UPDATES In as little as ONE DAY! Affordable prices - No payments for 18 months! Lifetime warranty & professional installs. Senior & Military Discounts available. Call: 1-877-510-9918. (AAN CAN)
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CASH PAID FOR HIGH-END MEN'S SPORT WATCHES Rolex, Breitling, Omega, Patek Philippe, Heuer, Daytona, GMT, Submariner and Speedmaster. These brands only! Call for a quote: 1-855-402-7109 (AAN CAN)
DENIED SOCIAL SECURITY DISABILITY? APPEAL! If you're 50+, filed SSD and denied, our attorneys can help. Win or pay Nothing! Strong, recent work history needed. 877-553-0252 [Steppacher Law Offices LLC Principal Office: 224 Adams Ave Scranton PA 18503] (NC Press)
DON'T PAY FOR COVERED HOME REPAIRS AGAIN American Residential Warranty covers all major systems and appliances. 30 day risk free. $100 off popular plans. 888-993-0878. (NC Press)
GET A BREAK ON YOUR TAXES! Donate your car, truck, or SUV to assist the blind and visually impaired. Arrange a swift, no-cost vehicle pickup and secure a generous tax credit for 2025. Call Heritage for the Blind today at 1-855-869-7055 today! (NC Press)
GOT AN UNWANTED CAR? Donate it to Patriotic Hearts. Fast free pick up. All 50 States. Patriotic Hearts’ programs help veterans find work or start their own business. Call 24/7: 1-855-402-7631. (AAN CAN)
GOT TAX PROBLEMS? Owe under 10k to the IRS? Get affordable tax help you deserve! Start for just $49/ mo. Call Tax Response Center 877-824-1321. (NC Press)
HEARING AIDS High-quality rechargeable, powerful Audien hearing aids priced 90% less than competitors. Tiny and nearly invisible! 45-day money back guarantee. 888-970-4637. (NC Press)
NAME CHANGE I, Shrishti, am changing my name from Shrishti to Shrishti Kamboj for all future references.
NEED NEW WINDOWS?
Drafty rooms? Chipped or damaged frames? Need outside noise reduction? New, energy efficient windows may be the answer! Call for a consultation & FREE quote today. 1-877-248-9944.
(AAN CAN)
PEST CONTROL Protect your home from pests safely and affordably. Roaches, Bed Bugs, Rodent, Termite, Spiders and other pests. Locally owned and affordable. Call for service or an inspection today! 1-833-237-1199. (AAN CAN)
REPLACE YOUR ROOF With the best looking and longest lasting material – steel from Erie Metal Roofs! Three styles and multiple colors available.
Guaranteed to last a lifetime! Limited time offer – up to 50% off installation + additional 10% off install (for military, health workers & 1st responders). Call Erie Metal Roofs: 1-855-585-1815. (NC Press)
STOP OVERPAYING FOR AUTO INSURANCE A recent survey says that most Americans are overpaying for their car insurance. Let us show you how much you can save. Call now for a no obligation quote: 1-866-472-8309
(AAN CAN)
TOP CA$H PAID FOR OLD GUITARS! 1920-1980 Gibson, Martin, Fender, Gretsch, Epiphone, Guild, Mosrite, Rickenbacker, Prairie State, D'Angelico, Stromberg. And Gibson Mandolins / Banjos. 1-877-560-5054. (NC Press)
WATER DAMAGE CLEANUP
& RESTORATION A small amount of water can lead to major damage and mold growth in your home. We do complete repairs to protect your family and your home's value! For a free estimate, call 24/7: 1-888-290-2264 (AAN CAN)
WATER DAMAGE CLEANUP
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Open Studio Sale
Jon Michael Riley
March 1 & 2 • March 8 & 9 10am-5pm 92 Acorn Lane, Fletcher
High-quality digital prints, framed and unframed, as well as miscellaneous artwork from his collection. Jon moved to Asheville from New York in 1991. For
value! Call 24/7: 1-888-3131427. Have zip code of service location ready when you call. (NC Press)
WE BUY VINTAGE GUITARS
Looking for 1920-1980 Gibson, Martin, Fender, Gretsch, Epiphone, Guild, Mosrite, Rickenbacker, Prairie State, D'Angelico, Stromberg. And Gibson Mandolins / Banjos. These brands only! Call for a quote: 1-855-402-7208 (AAN CAN)
YOU MAY QUALIFY For disability benefits if you have are between 52-63 years old and under a doctor’s care for a health condition that prevents you from working for a year or more. Call now! 1-877-247-6750. (AAN CAN)
MIND, BODY, SPIRIT
HEALTH & FITNESS
ATTENTION OXYGEN
THERAPY USERS Discover oxygen therapy that moves with you with Inogen Portable Oxygen Concentrators. Free information kit. Call 877-443-0443. (NC Press)
AUTOMOTIVE
AUTOS FOR SALE
PUBLIC SALE OF VEHICLE
To satisfy a lien for a 2000 BMW M5 against Mohun Patrick Nohria for $5965.00. Auto Safe Towing Inc., 474 ½ N. Louisiana Ave., Asheville NC 28806. 828-236-1131
MARKETPLACE
HOME IMPROVEMENT
BATH & SHOWER UPDATES in as little as one day. Affordable prices - No payments for 18 months! Lifetime warranty & professional installs. Senior & Military discounts available. Call: 1-877-560-1844. (NC Press)
ELIMINATE GUTTER
CLEANING FOREVER LeafFilter, the most advanced debris-blocking gutter protection. Schedule a free LeafFilter estimate today. 20% off entire purchase. Plus 10% Senior & Military discounts. Call 1-877-6491190. (NC Press)
ACROSS
1 Went by quickly
5 “___ knew?”
8 What to do “if you’ve heard this before”
14 Energy, of a sort
15 Possessed
16 Illinois city whose name serves as shorthand for mainstream taste
17 Look for trouble
19 Parthenon’s place
20 Offers, as a resignation
21 Good for nothing 22 Espy
23 Mass transit vehicle
24 Stock market index, in brief 25 “Nova” airer
28 Put a name to
31 “Oh, I see it now!”
33 West Coast gas brand
35 Gig makeup?
36 Went wrong 38 & 40 Open for business
42 One who parties hearty
43 Performer who thinks inside the box?
45 Brand of cooler
46 Scrape (by) 47 Scholar
50 “Spring forward” result: Abbr.
51 Show where the term “Debbie Downer” originated, in brief
Media clutter
Fit for a king
Triangular pastries
Run for the hills 64 Popular wine from Bordeaux 65 See 63-Down 66 Leave behind 67 Spots for Hawaii and Alaska, often 68 Source of Roquefort cheese 69 Stanch
Hyenas and raccoons, for two
1 Partner of loose 2 Instrument depicted in Caravaggio’s “The Musicians” 3 Sportscaster Andrews 4 Suit in a tarot deck 5 Question from someone who’s lost 6 Does some baling 7 Shelley’s “___ to the West Wind”
