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MADE IN USA
DEPARTMENTS
June 2022
9 Simple Life
By Jim Dodson
12 Short Stories 15 Tea Leaf Astrologer
By Zora Stellanova
17 Life’s Funny
By Maria Johnson
21 The Omnivorous Reader
By Anne Blythe
25 Bookshelf 28 The Creators of N.C.
By Wiley Cash
33 Home by Design
By Cynthia Adams
35 Beloved Possessions
By Jim Dodson
36 The Artist's Eye
By Allen Siegler
40 Botanicus
By Ross Howell Jr.
43 Birdwatch
By Susan Campbell
47 Wandering Billy
By Billy Eye
86 Events Calendar 96 O.Henry Ending
By David Claude Bailey
FEATURES 51
Diving for the Anchor Poetry by Stephen E. Smith
52 Millennial Plant Passion By Cynthia Adams Turning Over Every Leaf in Search of the Perfect “It” Plant 62 A Rose in Bloom by Ross Howell Jr. An Abstract Painter finds inspiration — and herself — in the natural world 68
Happy Campers By Maria Johnson Greensboro native Alice Zealy remodels recreational vehicles with verve
77
Almanac By Ashley Walshe
Cover photograph and photograph this page by Bert VanderVeen
4 O.Henry
The Art & Soul of Greensboro
Now Showng & Under Contract
M A G A Z I N E
Volume 12, No. 6 “I have a fancy that every city has a voice.”
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6 O.Henry
Jack Andrews, Frank Daniels Jr., Frank Daniels III, Lee Dirks, David Woronoff © Copyright 2022. Reproduction in whole or in part without written permission is prohibited. O.Henry Magazine is published by The Pilot LLC
The Art & Soul of Greensboro
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THE GREENSBORO SYMPHONY GUILD WOULD LIKE TO THANK OUR 2021-2022 SPONSORS THE GREENSBORO SYMPHONY GUILD WOULD LIKE TO THANK OUR 2021-2022 SPONSORS SYMPHONY $10,000 THE GREENSBORO GREENSBORO SYMPHONY GUILD WOULD LIKE TOWOULD THE SYMPHONY GUILD WOULD LIKE TO THE GREENSBORO GUILD WOULD LIKE TO THE GREENSBORO SYMPHONY GUILD THE GREENSBORO SYMPHONY SYMPHONY GUILD WOULD LIKE TOLIKE TO THANK OUR 2021-2022 SPONSORS THANK OUR 2021-2022 SPONSORS THANK OUR 2021-2022 SPONSORS SYMPHONY $10,000 THE GREENSBORO SYMPHONY GUILD WOULD LIKE TO THANK 2021-2022 SPONSORS THE GREENSBORO GREENSBORO SYMPHONY GUILD WOULD LIKE LIKE TO TO THE GUILD WOULD THANK OUR OURSYMPHONY 2021-2022 SPONSORS
to our 2021-2022 sponsors THANK OUR 2021-2022 SPONSORS
SYMPHONY $10,000 THANK OUR OUR 2021-2022 2021-2022 SPONSORS THANK SPONSORS THE GREENSBORO THE GREENSBORO SYMPHONY SYMPHONY GUILD GUILD WOULD WOULD LIKE LIKE TO TO SYMPHONY $10,000 SYMPHONY $10,000 SYMPHONY $10,000 THANK OUR 2021-2022 SPONSORS THANK OUR 2021-2022 SPONSORS THE GREENSBORO SYMPHONY GUILD WOULD LIKE TO THE GREENSBORO SYMPHONY GUILD WOULD LIKE TO SYMPHONY $10,000 THE GREENSBORO GREENSBORO SYMPHONY GUILD WOULD WOULD LIKE LIKE TO TO THE SYMPHONY GUILD SYMPHONY $10,000 SYMPHONY $10,000 $10,000 THANK OUR 2021-2022 SPONSORS THANK OUR SPONSORS SYMPHONY THANKSYMPHONY OUR 2021-2022 2021-2022 SPONSORS THANK OUR 2021-2022 SPONSORS SYMPHONY $10,000 $10,000
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Simple Life
The Incomplete Gardener We dream and scheme — and forever learn
By Jim Dodson
Over the
ILLUSTRATION BY GERRY O'NEILL
past five years, I’ve been building a garden in the old neighborhood where I grew up, a garden of shade and light beneath towering oaks, and my third effort at a major landscape project. Each one has been distinctly different from the one before it. The first was a woodland retreat I built on 15 acres atop a sunny coastal hill in Maine, carved out of a beautiful forest of beech and birch. I was a new father when the gardening bug bit with emphasis, inspired by the British sporting estates and spectacular public botanical gardens I routinely visited in my work as a golf editor and outdoors correspondent for a pair of national magazines. My children spent the first decade of their lives on that hilltop, living in a rugged post-and-beam house I built with my own hands and never expected to leave. It was, or so I told myself, my dream home and private garden sanctuary, the last place on earth I would abandon. My own growing obsession with gardening even inspired me to spend two years researching and writing a book about the horticulture world, the beautiful madness that overtakes those who fall in love with shaping landscape. It was difficult to say goodbye to that little piece of heaven, but life changes when you least expect. That’s an important lesson of living. When I had an opportunity to come home to the South and teach writing at a top Virginia university and start a trio of arts magazines across my home state of North Carolina, I didn’t hesitate. The Art & Soul of Greensboro
Next came a cottage on two acres in Pinehurst that we inhabited for a year with the full intention of buying. The property came with a charming but wildly overgrown garden and an aging swimming pool. Over a full year, I liberated a handsome serpentine brick fence, rebuilt the garden and enclosed the property with a new wooden fence and gate. We also updated the pool and enjoyed it for the span of one lovely summer. Our golden retriever, Ajax, particularly enjoyed the pool, taking himself for a dip every morning and floating for hours on his own air mattress. The problem was the cottage. It was built over a forest swamp and turned out, upon the required inspection for sale, to have massive mold below decks. The entire structure had to be immediately evacuated and gutted. We took a bath on the deal, a gamble, and lost a small fortune. But such is life. One lives, learns and moves on. The mid-century house we bought six years ago in the Piedmont city where I grew up was built by the Corry family — a beautiful California-style bungalow that was Big Al Corry’s dream house. Mama Corry was the last to live in it, and the family was thrilled when they learned we were buying it because I had grown up two doors away from the Corry boys. As we approach six years on the grounds, restoration of the house is nearly complete. Sometime later this summer, after I finish the stone pathways and install a new wooden fence and gate, my latest woodland garden will be complete as well. Or will it? One of the lessons I’ve learned from building three ambiO.Henry 9
Simple Life tious gardens is that a garden is never complete — and neither is its creator. We don’t just grow a garden. It continually grows us. I think of this phenomenon as the garden within. We scheme and dream, we build and revise, we learn from the past, forever growing. As my friend Tony Avent, the gifted Raleigh plantsman once told me during the five weeks we spent together hunting aboriginal plants in the upland wilds of South Africa, no garden — or gardener — is ever complete. “You’re not really a serious gardener until you’ve killed a lot of innocent plants,” he pointed out, “and learned from the experience. You just have to get down in the dirt and do it.” I blame verdure in the bloodstream and dirt beneath my fingernails for this earthly addiction, probably a legacy of the old Piedmont family of rural farmers, gardeners and preachers from Alamance and Orange counties that I hail from. When I was a kid, both my parents were devoted amateur landscape gardeners. My father’s thing was lawns and shrubs, and my mother was widely admired for her spectacular peonies and roses come May and June. A few years back, about the time Ajax the dog was enjoying his daily floats in a swimming pool we rebuilt but never owned, a lovely woman who purchased my family’s home got in touch.
She was planning to sell the house in order to move into a senior adult community — and wouldn’t I like to come and dig up some of my mom’s spectacular peonies? I thanked her and promised I would soon drop by, shovel in hand. But, sadly, I got so busy with work and travel, I failed to get there before the house was sold and the peony row was plowed under by the new owners. Another life lesson from the garden — everything in life has an expiration date. Delay may cost regret. But sometimes, when you least expect it, another opportunity comes along, a chance for more growth. This latest garden saved my sanity during the lost days of the COVID pandemic. It’s designed for hot summer days now upon us, cooled by more than 20 flowering trees I’ve planted around the property, creating my version of an urban woodland retreat — a Scottish vale, as I imagine it — where birds gather to feed each evening and the aging gardener sits with a fine bourbon in hand, still scheming and dreaming. In the meantime, this month, the new peony row I planted last summer in memory of my mom — using the same small wooden-handled pot she used to plant things in her garden — should really be something to see. OH Jim Dodson is the founding editor of O.Henry.
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Run Hard, Speakeasy If your favorite things to pound are pours and pavement, lace up your sneakers and put on your jazziest glow gear. At 8:30 p.m., Saturday, June 11, the Greensboro Distilling Speakeasy 5K takes off for an after-dark, out-andback run through downtown — with a finish line conveniently located at Fainting Goat Spirits. Once you’ve completed the course, enjoy live jazz music and sip artisanal grain-to-glass cocktails that pair well with salty perspiration. Who knew running could be such whiskey business? Race ya to the bar! Use code ohey15 to receive a %15 registration discount. Info: www.triviumracing.com; to subscribe to receive weekly happenings in the O.Hey voice, visit oheygreensboro.com.
Juneteenth Last year, Juneteenth became a national holiday, commemorating June 19, 1865, when Blacks in Galveston, Texas were liberated from the institution of slavery. To highlight the resilience, solidarity and culture of Juneteenth specifically and Black heritage in general, Greensboro is hosting a three-day celebration. Kick things off at 8 p.m. on Thursday, June 16, when Sistars of Juneteenth fill the stage with Black female artistry in multiple forms, from live-painting to hiphop dance and poetry. Move over Cinderella — at 8 p.m., Friday, June 17, ditch those glass slippers and don your fanciest kicks plus your best black-tie affair attire for the Uptown FRESH Sneakerball. Also on Friday, from 7:30–9 p.m., the Arts Legacy Awards honor the impact Black artists have had in Greensboro. On Sunday, June 19, festivities continue with loads of park-hopping fun. From 11 a.m.–7 p.m., Douglas Park comes alive with Family Day, filled with activities for the whole crew. Hit Barber Park from 2:30–5:30 p.m. for an interfaith Gospel Superfest. And finally, end Juneteenth full of joy — and delicious eats — at a Black Food Truck Fest, featuring sweet and savory bites, a DJ and an open mic from 6–8 p.m. at LeBauer Park. Info: juneteenthgso.com.
12 O.Henry
All the Porch is a Stage If this porch is rocking, you’d better come a’knockin’! Actually, no need to announce your entry. Just pull up a blanket or chair on one of many concert meadows — aka front lawns — during Dunleath Porchfest from noon until 5 p.m. on Saturday, June 11. During this free, family-friendly event, porches transform into stages for local musicians sharing their talents. Stroll from one historic bungalow to the next, taking in the fiddling, guitar-picking and soulful harmonizing of performers such as the Headless Chickens, The Alley Rabbits and the Goodbye Horses, plus 46 others that may or may not charm children with animals in their names. End the day with a final performance at Sternberger Park. Attendees are encouraged to show their community spirit by bringing nonperishable food items for the Triad Health Project food pantry. Info: dunleath.org. The Art & Soul of Greensboro
Ogi Sez Ogi Overman
Are You Ready for Some Hank Williams Jr.? Beginning his musical career at the age of 8 by singing his father’s songs in a Swainsboro, Georgia show, Hank Williams Jr. has proven over his seven decades of performing that a country boy can indeed survive. Since his young, young debut, Williams has earned himself a place in the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame, won Emmy and Grammy awards, and has been named Entertainer of the year multiple times by the Country Music Association and the Academy of Country Music. He’s not only survived — he’s thrived. At 8 p.m on Friday, June 24, round up all your rowdy friends for a night of honky-tonk at the Greensboro Coliseum as only Hank Williams Jr. can deliver. Info: greensborocoliseum.com.
Do You Believe in Magic? Calling all mythical and magical beings, woodland witches and wannabe wizards! Sprinkle yourself with fairy dust, twinkle your nose and flit over to Lindley Park for the Greensboro Summer Solstice Festival from 2–10 p.m. on Saturday, June 18. No wings? No problem. Behold vendors peddling everything you need to nourish (and become) your most mystical self. Throughout the day (and it is the longest in 364 days), two stages come alive with musicians, dancers and enchantresses. An hour-long participatory drum circle resounds to the heartbeat of the diverse community the festival honors. And finally, at 9 p.m., pull up a toadstool and watch as the night ends with a blazing finale, glowing with LED hoopers and fire spinners. Welcome the season of the sun by celebrating its many gifts. Info: greensborosummersolstice.org. The Art & Soul of Greensboro
You can look at June one of two ways. Either the bugs and snakes are out, the lawn needs mowing, the heat and humidity are dreadful, and football season is still four months away. Or, the pollen is mercifully gone, the flowers are blooming, the evenings are perfect and it’s baseball season. All the above are true, so you decide whether to whine or celebrate. I’d wager, though, that almost all music lovers fall in the celebratory category. Further, that if the whiners listened to more music and went to more live shows, many would ease on over to the bright side. Just as June, the tunes are bustin’ out all over, so what better time to start?
• June 4, Ramkat (W-S): My dear departed friend, John
Stephenson, owner of School Kids Records, befriended Robert Earl Keen before anyone knew who he was. During John’s last days, Robert Earl gave him and his wife Diane a closed-door show with an audience of two before his gig that night at Ziggy’s. Aside from his boundless talent and song craftsmanship, you need to know what kind of man he is.
• June 8, Tanger Center: I started to say there’s no royalty like Sir Elton John on the bill at Tanger this month, but then I realized that, title or not, Bonnie Raitt is pure royalty. Both her voice and slide wizardry are instantly recognizable; there’s simply no one like her. • June 9, Carolina Theatre: I must admit, I was late to the party for JJ Grey & Mofro. But I am definitely making up for lost time. His chill-bump-inducing voice does the impossible, going from a Rod Stewart rasp to an upper-register Adele warble — in the same song. Plus, Mofro includes a horn section, two killer harmony vocalists and a Hammond B3, as well as Grey’s sweet guitar work. • June 11, Greensboro Coliseum: I can’t prove it, but it seems plausible that the genre “Urban Contemporary” was invented for Keith Sweat. There’s not much he hasn’t done as a performer, producer, songwriter, radio show host and mentor to aspiring talent. He has released 15 albums and was given the Soul Train Lifetime Achievement Award in 2013, which speaks volumes. • June 25, Ziggy’s.Space (HP): I was initially intrigued by
Flatland Cavalry because of their looks. They remind me of, say, Goose Creek Symphony and New Riders of the Purple Sage, two of my favs from the hippie days. And their sound is not unlike that bevy of country rock bands of the era. Plus, it didn’t hurt a bit that they’re from Buddy Holly’s hometown of Lubbock, Texas. All that aside, there is nothing derivative about them; they stand on their own. O.Henry 13
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Tea leaf “fortunes” for the rest of you: Cancer (June 21 – July 22)
Give it time. The wound becomes the medicine. Leo (July 23 – August 22)
It was never about the honey. Virgo (August 23 – September 22)
Ditch the training wheels. Libra (September 23 – October 22)
You’ve mastered subtlety. Don’t be surprised that no one’s noticed. Scorpio (October 23 – November 21)
Let the patterns clash. Sagittarius (November 22 – December 21)
Maybe take it down a notch. Capricorn (December 22 – January 19)
Reply hazy. Try again. Aquarius (January 20 – February 18)
Does the phrase “dirty laundry” mean anything to you? Pisces (February 19 – March 20)
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You’re cutting against the grain again. Taurus (April 20 – May 20)
You are what you eat. Try adding some flavor. OH Zora Stellanova has been divining with tea leaves since Game of Thrones’ Starbucks cup mishap of 2019. While she’s not exactly a medium, she’s far from average. She lives in the N.C. foothills with her Sphynx cat, Lyla. The Art & Soul of Greensboro
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O.Henry 15
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Life's Funny
Paper Chase The joys of springtime shredding return By Maria Johnson
My heart leapt in my chest.
There, on my laptop screen, was a solid sign that the pre-pandemic pleasures of life were returning. Shredding events were back. Yee-ha! In case you’ve had your head stuck in a pile of papers, shredding events are community gatherings that involve long lines of cars dropping off loads of personal documents at designated sites, where boxy trucks with huge metal teeth grind them to ribbons — grrrunch, grrrunch, grrrunch — in front of your very eyes. It’s a contemporary phenomenon, this voluntary destruction of docs, and it usually happens on Saturdays, which adds to the going-to-the-fair feeling. For your viewing pleasure, some shredding trucks are outfitted with screens showing live feeds from cameras focused on the churning blades and the mountain of pulp inside the truck. “People like looking at their stuff getting shredded. They really like that,” says 33-year-old Jorge Acosta, who drives for a company called Shred Ace Inc. “It’s a peace of mind thing. I get it. Once those documents go in, they’re not coming out.” That’s comforting in an age when almost everyone knows what it means to be hacked, breached or compromised. Bottom line: Public shredding is one of the most cathartic, satisfying experiences I’ve ever had, so much so that I’m willing to overlook my disdain for the word “event,” as in “weather event”
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(tornado) or “cardiac event” (heart attack). Every spring — peak season, as any master shredder knows — I schlep old records to an advertised event, where I feel a deep kinship with other defenders of the PIN. That’s one reason 2020 was small-T traumatic for me. Not only did COVID inflict true suffering on millions, it cancelled public shreddings far and wide for two years. Sniff-sniff. I missed myyyyyyy evennnnnnnnnnts. So imagine my joy when mass shredding resumed this spring. Finally, the mountain of old files that kept me from reconfiguring the closet in my office could be cleared. Now, the hard work — weighing what to keep and what to shred — began. Some of them were no-brainers. Paycheck stubs, expense reports and tax returns more than a few years old? Gone. Receipts from ancient purchases and routine medical appointments? Outta here. Statements from accounts closed long ago? Sayonara, suckers. Other papers, that stirred memories, were harder to part with. A tattered file marked “Furniture” stopped me. I leafed through receipts and notes about pieces my husband and I bought when we first started housekeeping 30-plus years ago. I smiled at copies of letters — typed on a chunky computer monitor, spat out of a dot-matrix printer and mailed with a stamp — that I’d sent to a furniture retailer, insisting that they replace our brand new (cracked) dining room chairs with a new batch after their attempted repairs on the first set of chairs failed. O.Henry 17
Life's Funny
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18 O.Henry
Lord, I was feisty. And probably over the top. But effective. My grandmother had given us money to buy that dining room furniture, and I was going to make her gift right. She’s been gone for 25 years now, but when I thought about how much she liked that furniture, and how proud she was to have had a hand in making our home, she was with me again. I kept the letters and pitched the receipts. My husband got into the game, combing through files stuffed with his college course work. He kept a few tests marked “100.” We joked that we should start a new file called “Damn, I Was Good.” And maybe another one called, “Damn, That Was Stupid,” which we’d fill with evidence of the investments we’d sold right before they took off. Expensive lessons in patience, indeed. We loaded the car with boxes and bags of old files and headed to the event. My pulse quickened when I saw a line of cars backed out onto the street, like a queue of concert-goers waiting to get into the venue. Doubt crept in. What if we were throwing away something we’d need later? I crawled into the backseat and started pulling files. Then I said to heck with it. There probably was a mistake, a future regret, in there somewhere. So be it. Half an hour later, we forked over a donation of $5 per box — some organizations use shredding events as fundraisers — and pulled up beside the hungry truck. Volunteers emptied our boxes into a huge plastic trash bin and rolled it to the truck. We watched as mechanical arms clasped, raised and tipped the bin into the shredder. Grrrunch, grrrunch, grrrunch. Gone for good. Ashes to ashes. Pulp to pulp. It’s the best show in town. On paper, anyway. OH Maria Johnson is a contributing editor of O.Henry magazine. You can reach her at ohenrymaria@gmail.com. The Art & Soul of Greensboro
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Dame Agatha’s Mystery
A novel look at Christie’s 11-day disappearance
By Anne Blythe
Dame Agatha Christie, the
famed author who wrote 66 detective novels in her 85 years, left the conclusion of one very public mystery untold. While some details are known about what happened in December 1926 when the prolific writer famously went missing for 11 days, much remains unknown. That has led to an array of books and films in which writers attempt to piece together clues, fill in gaps and offer theories about Christie’s perplexing disappearance. Nina de Gramont, a creative writing professor at the University of North Carolina Wilmington, has put forward an intriguing and inventive account in her latest novel, The Christie Affair. She tells her story from the perspective of the mistress who, history tells us, broke up the marriage of Christie and her first husband, Archie. Here’s what we know from newspaper accounts. The search for Christie included hundreds of police officers, planes, amateur sleuths on bicycles and in cars, musings from fellow mystery writers Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and Dorothy Sayers, and even a séance at the site where her green Morris Cowley was found deserted in a ditch in the English countryside. Many theories were posed about what happened to the “lady novelist,” as some journalists described Christie. Was her body at the bottom of the Silent Pool, the lake in Surrey, England, near the abandoned car? Could the mystery writer, not so well-known at the time, be pulling a publicity stunt? The hunt ended some 200 miles north of Sunningdale, where the author lived with her husband Archie and their daughter, when it was revealed that Christie had checked into the Swan Hydropathic Hotel in Harrogate using the name Theresa Neele. It was not known at the time by the public, but The Art & Soul of Greensboro
Neele was the last name of Archie’s mistress, the woman he planned to leave his wife for. Christie’s only public explanation of her whereabouts came in a February 1928 interview with the Daily Mail, in which she described being in a state of depression after her mother’s death in 1926 and suffering from “private troubles,” which she said she preferred not to get into with the reporter. The Daily Mail reported that Christie contemplated death by suicide several times before driving her car into the remote ditch, hitting something, being flung against the steering wheel and bumping her head. It has long been questioned whether Christie truly had amnesia as the family reported after a public outcry about the extensive search and cost of it when it was revealed the author had been staying in the hotel under an assumed name. “Up to this moment, I was Mrs. Christie,” she told the Daily Mail. In her book, Gramont names her narrator Nan O’Dea, a departure from Nancy Neele, the real-life other woman. Without giving short shrift to details of the headline-grabbing disappearance available in newspaper archives around the world, de Gramont devises a double-pronged plot. She alternates between Nan’s account of the days and crucial moments before Christie went missing and a backstory filled with sadness and grief that drives the fictional narrator. We’re transported from London to Ireland and the worlds of the haves and have-nots amid World War I. We move back and forth between Nan’s early days and her first powerful love in Ireland to Christie’s unraveling marriage and the 11 days that inspired the novel. Slowly, we find out why Nan sets her sights on Archie and aggressively works to woo him away from Agatha to achieve a greater love that becomes clearer as the suspense unravels. O.Henry 21
Omnivorous Reader Like the “Queen of Crime,” Gramont has a knack for mystery. She lures her readers in with her first sentence: “A long time ago in another country, I almost killed a woman.” The North Carolina author also has a gift for leaving subtle signs of what lies ahead, putting pointers in plain sight in the style of Christie. “Anyone who says I have no regrets is either a psychopath or a liar,” Nan, the narrator, says in the opening chapter when asked by her sister whether she regrets what she did. “I am neither of those things, simply adept at keeping secrets. In this way, the first Mrs. Christie and the second are very much alike. We both know you can’t tell your own story without exposing someone else’s. Her whole life, Agatha refused to answer any questions about the eleven days she was missing, and it wasn’t only because she needed to protect herself. I would have refused to answer, too, if anyone had thought to ask.” Right at the start, we find out what will become clear in the end — Nan ends up with Archie and Agatha does not. What we get from de Gramont’s evocative and layered scenes between the beginning and end are often twists, steamy romance, deadpan humor, an unexpected body (as necessary in any Christie mystery) and adventures to old-fashioned villages
22 O.Henry
with a cast of mostly affable, but complicated characters. “As readers our minds reach toward longed for conclusions,” de Gramont writes as Nan brings her own narrative to a close with an ending that’s not all rosy. Her storyline for Agatha, though, concludes with a happier image. “A mystery should end with a killer revealed, and so it has,” de Gramont writes toward the end of her book. “A quest should end with a treasure restored. And so it has. A tragic love story should end with its lovers dead or departed. But a romance. That should end with lovers reunited. Beyond the confines of these pages, life will go tumbling forward. But this is my story. I can make anything happen, unbeholden to a future that now has become the past. I can leave you with a single image, and we pretend it lasts forever. So for this part of the story, let’s stop here.” The author’s masterful storytelling leaves you longing for more. OH Anne Blythe has been a reporter in North Carolina for more than three decades. She has covered city halls, higher education, the courts, crime, hurricanes, ice storms, droughts, floods, college sports, health care and many wonderful characters who make this state such an interesting place.
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MUSIC
Summer 2022
Concert Schedule
for a
Sunday Evening in the Park
ALL CONCERTS BEGIN AT 6 PM
June 05 June 12 Greensboro Big Band @ Greensboro College
Philharmonia of Greensboro @ Lindley Park
Taqueria El Azteca Taco Truck & Slush Rush
Off the Hook & Sweet Cold Treats and Funnel Cakes
June 26 Greensboro Concert Band @ LeBauer Park Off the Hook & Sweet Cold Treats and Funnel Cakes
July 24 A Sign of the Times @ Gateway Gardens Hot Diggity Dog & Scoop Zone
June 19 @ 2:30 pm Gospel Superfest: Interfaith Celebration @ Barber Park Hosted by Juneteenth GSO Fest
July 10
Sunqueen Kelcey and the Soular Flares @ Latham Park
July 17
The Beauty Operators @ Guilford College
Sweet’s Turkey BBQ and Catering & Scoop Zone
July 31
Taqueria El Azteca Taco Truck & Scoop Zone
Aug 07
Nu Blu @ Country Park
doby @ Keeley Park
Sweet’s Turkey BBQ and Catering & Slush Rush
Hot Diggity Dog & Slush Rush
Aug 14
Aug 21
West End Mambo @ White Oak Amphitheatre
Knights of Soul @ Barber Park
Concessions Available Onsite
Sweet’s Turkey BBQ and Catering & Scoop Zone
Aug 28 Emanuel Wynter & Freeport Jazz @ Hester Park Off the Hook & Sweet Cold Treats and Funnel Cakes
FREE TO ATTEND | DONATIONS ACCEPTED | FREE PARKING
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Bookshelf
June Books
Compiled by Shannon Purdy Jones
Do you ever sit back and think, “Wow, how
did I get so lucky?”
It’s a thought that pops into my head at least once a summer, every summer, usually while I’m out paddleboarding on Lake Brandt or camping with my kids at Badin Lake. Because, really, is there any better place to live than North Carolina in the summertime? Whether it’s trails to be trod in our gorgeous mountains and Piedmont, waves to be surfed on the Outer Banks, or backwaters to be kayaked, our beautiful state has so much to offer. So much, in fact, that I invariably end up with a N.C. summer bucket list too long to ever finish. While you’re busy exploring all our home state has to offer, you need a good summer read — set in North Carolina, naturally — or two (or five!). Between mysteries and romance, historical fiction and nature exploration, there’s something for everyone. Dive in and get in that North Carolina state of mind this summer.
Smile Beach Murder (Outer Banks Bookshop Mystery) by Alicia Bessette When Callie is laid off from her reporting job, she returns to her hometown of Cattail Island and lands a gig at the local bookstore — the same one where she found comfort after her mother died, tumbling from the top of the lighthouse. As the anniversary of her mother’s death approaches, islanders are once again gossiping about the tragedy. Then, devastating news strikes. The lighthouse has claimed another victim,
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Eva Meeks, of Meeks Hardware. The police are calling it suicide, but Callie is not buying it. In Callie’s search for answers, she enlists the help of some beloved books and several new friends, including the handsome local martial arts instructor, Toby Dodge. As she earns enemies in pursuit of the truth, Callie knows she will either uncover the killer or become a victim herself.
Where the Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens Sensitive and intelligent, Kya Clark, known as the Marsh Girl, has survived for years alone in the marsh that she calls home, finding friends in the gulls and lessons in the sand. Then the time comes when she yearns to be touched and loved. When two young men from town become intrigued by her wild beauty, Kya opens herself to a new life — until she become a murder suspect. Where the Crawdads Sing is at once an exquisite ode to the natural world, a heartbreaking coming-of-age story, and a surprising tale of murder. Owens reminds us that we are forever shaped by the children we once were, and that we are all subject to the beautiful and violent secrets nature keeps.
The Night Swim by Megan Goldin Ever since her true-crime podcast became an overnight sensation and set an innocent man free, Rachel Krall has become a household name — and the last hope for people seeking justice. The new season of Rachel’s podcast has brought her to a small town being torn apart by the trial of a local golden boy, a swimmer destined for Olympic greatness, accused of raping the beloved granddaughter of the police chief. Meanwhile, someone
O.Henry 25
Bookshelf is following her and won’t stop until Rachel finds out what happened to the anonymous writer’s sister 25 years ago. Electrifying and propulsive, The Night Swim asks: What is the price of a reputation? Can a small town ever right the wrongs of its past? And what really happened to Jenny?
Under a Gilded Moon by Joy Jordan-Lake Biltmore House, a palatial mansion being built by American “royalty,” the Vanderbilts, is in its final stages of construction. The country’s grandest example of privilege, it symbolizes the aspirations of its owner and the dreams of a girl, just as driven, who lives in its shadow. After two years in college in New York City, family obligations call Kerry McGrefor home to the beautiful Appalachians where her family’s land is among the last pieces required to complete the Biltmore Estate. One by one, outsiders descend on the changing landscape — a fugitive from Sicily, a reporter chasing a groundbreaking story, a debutante tainted by scandal and a conservationist prepared to put anyone at risk to stoke the resentment of the locals. As Kerry finds herself caught in a war between wealth and poverty, innocence and corruption, she must navigate not only her own pride and desperation to survive but also the temptations of fortune and the men who control it.
The Watery Part of the World by Michael Parker Michael Parker’s vast and involving novel about pirates and slaves, treason and treasures, madness and devotion, takes place on a remote and tiny island battered by storms. Inspired by two little-known moments in history, the tale begins in 1813, when Theodosia Burr, en route to New York by ship to meet her father, Aaron Burr, disappears off the coast of North Carolina. A hundred and fifty years later, the last three inhabitants of a remote island — two elderly white women and the black man who takes care of them — are forced to leave their beloved spot of land. Parker tells an enduring story about what we’ll sacrifice for love and what we won’t.
Book Lovers by Emily Henry (And it’s the Scuppernong Books Romance Book Club’s June read!) Nora Stephens’ life as a cutthroat literary agent is books — she’s read them all. But she is not that type of heroine. Not the plucky one, not the laidback dream girl and especially not the sweetheart. She’s a hero to her clients and her beloved little sister, Libby. Which is why she agrees to go to Sunshine Falls, North Carolina, for the month of August when Libby begs her for a sisters’ trip away — with visions of a small town transforma-
is your smile
summer ready? 26 O.Henry
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Bookshelf tion for Nora. Libby is convinced Nora needs to become the heroine in her own story. But instead of picnics in meadows, or run-ins with a handsome country doctor, Nora keeps bumping into Charlie Lastra, a bookish, brooding editor from the city. It would be a meet-cute if not for the fact that they’ve met many times — and it’s never been cute. If Nora knows she’s not an ideal heroine, Charlie knows he’s nobody’s hero. But as they are thrown together again and again — in a series of coincidences no editor worth their salt would allow — what they discover might just unravel the carefully crafted stories they’ve written about themselves.
Forest Walking: Discovering the Trees and Woodlands of North America by Peter Wohlleben and Jill Billinghurst With Forest Walking, German forester Peter Wohlleben teams up with his longtime editor, Jane Billinghurst, as the two coauthor their first book together. Together, they will teach you how to listen to what the forest is saying, no matter where you live or which trees you plan to visit next, such as: What can you learn by following the spread of a root, by tasting the tip of a branch, by searching out that bitter almond smell? What creatures can be found in a stream if you turn over a rock — and what is the best way to cross a forest stream?
How can you understand a forest’s history by the feel of the path underfoot, the scars on the trees along the trail, or the play of sunlight through the branches? How can we safely explore the forest at night? What activities can we use to engage children with the forest?
How to Read a North Carolina Beach: Bubble Holes, Barking Sands, and Rippled Runnels by Orrin H. Pilkey, Tracy Monegan Rice and William J. Neal In How to Read a North Carolina Beach, three leading experts in coastal geology provide a guidebook to North Carolina beach characteristics for recreational beachgoers and naturalists. Topics include the interaction of wind, waves and sand in the formation of dunes and barrier islands; smaller features such as sea foam, bubble holes and sharks’ teeth; and strategies for conservation. What makes sea foam? What are those tiny sand volcanoes along the waterline? You’ll find the answers to these questions and dozens more in this comprehensive field guide to the state’s beaches. Shannon Purdy Jones is store manager, children’s book buyer and one of the co-owners of Scuppernong Books. OH Shannon Purdy Jones is co-owner of Scuppernong Books.
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O.Henry 27
The Creators of N.C.
Imprinting the Land The artistry of printmaker Katie Hayes By Wiley Cash Photographs by Mallory Cash
About half a mile
down a gravel road off a twolane highway in rural Hillsborough, block printmaker Katie Hayes is working in a lightfilled studio above her garage. It’s midday on a warm afternoon in late April. Sunlight slants through a canopy of tulip poplars and oaks, trickling down to the dogwoods that make up an understory that shades countless azaleas wild with blooms. I can’t see it from where I stand, gazing at the forest from the sliding glass door at the back of Katie’s studio, but I can hear a nearby cardinal chirping against a backdrop of birdcalls that echo through the trees. It’s not a stretch to say that the living things outside Katie’s studio parallel the flora and fauna portrayed in her prints: All around me, jet black herons with indigo wings stalk through shallow pools; brilliant monarchs and viceroys alight on purple coneflowers; scarlet tanagers perch on branches surrounded by yellow blossoms. Here, the wild things outside the studio’s walls have been tamed and contained, framed and matted, but no less alive than they would be in the natural world. Unlike the wildness of the woods, Katie’s studio space is meticulously managed. Drying prints lean against the wall on one side of the studio. Rollers — known as brayers — and ink and instruments made for cutting or measuring hang in various places within easy reach. A basket of pre-ordered prints featuring a yellow lady’s slipper rest in a basket, each print partnered with a personalized handwritten note from Katie. The airy space is orderly and organized, a far cry from the world outside its walls. “Setting this place up exactly as I need it feels really good,” Katie says. She is rolling midnight black ink onto a piece of plexiglass. “I never thought I’d have a place like this.” I know that Katie is talking about her studio, but she could be referring to the 10 acres she shares with Sean and their daughter, Millie, and son, Ben. Or she could just as easily be talking about Hillsborough, or even North Carolina, for that matter. Although she was raised in Cullowhee, North Carolina, at one point in her life she’d lived in 13 houses in four states, and that was before she and Sean settled in Ohio, where Sean worked for Oberlin College and Katie worked
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The Art & Soul of Greensboro
The Creators of N.C.
The Art & Soul of Greensboro
O.Henry 29
The Creators of N.C. for a nonprofit, assisting high school students with everything from completing college applications to tasks like locating their Social Security numbers. With each move, whether it was from the mountains of North Carolina to the Piedmont to attend UNCChapel Hill, or from Carrboro to Ohio, Katie began to see her regional identity more clearly. “It wasn’t until I really left the South that I realized that being a Southerner was part of my identity, like I didn’t realize that being a rural mountain kid was part of my identity until I went to Carolina,” she says. At the moment, Katie is using a heavy glass baren to smooth paper atop the block cut in order for it to absorb the ink that covers the block. The process of making a single print is long and tedious. After cutting a design into a block of linoleum, which can take anywhere from a couple of hours to a couple of days depending on the complexity of the image, Katie uses a brayer to evenly smear ink across a piece of plexiglass before using the same brayer to cover the block in ink. She then lays the paper over the block and runs the baren across the back of it. Most prints make use of more than one color ink, so each print goes through this process at least twice. Katie made her first print in an art class at Smoky Mountain High School in Jackson County. She carved a linocut of a rabbit, and after her teacher put it on display someone offered to buy it. She sold it for $15, and while she didn’t return to printmaking for
many years because she didn’t have the tools and materials, the early satisfaction of knowing that her work had spoken to someone stayed with her. What also stayed with her was the effect her grandmother’s art and practice had on her. Shirley O’Neill was an accomplished amateur watercolorist, and she always made sure that Katie had good materials — high quality paints, brushes and paper — in order to do her best work. I watch Katie make print after print, nervous that our conversation will distract her and cause her to make a mistake, and also impressed at how she seems both careful and carefree. The block she is working from now is for a 12x16 inch matboard print from her limited edition Mid-Century Botanical series. Each print features a colorful design — a gold sun, a soft pink segmented circle, a gray oval — overlaid by the black shapes of various flora: Virginia bluebells, native ferns and peonies. She peels back the matboard, revealing a cardinal flower set against a segmented gold sun. I watch her repeat the process of imprinting cardinal flowers on several more matboards with various colorful shapes already set onto them, and each time she reveals the flower her face lights up in a smile. “It feels so good,” she says. “When it works, it’s so good.” While the process is repetitive, it doesn’t allow Katie to shut off her brain and rely on rote memory. She is constantly assessing the amount of ink on the brayer, the placement of the paper against
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The Art & Soul of Greensboro
The Creators of N.C. the block, and the countless other adjustments she makes during a single print run, which she limits to 100. There are no reproductions. Every print is handmade, distinct and limited. Katie’s designs don’t only end up as hand-pulled prints made in her studio; her designs are also printed on everything from fabric to wallpaper by Spoonflower, a global marketplace based in Durham that manufactures textiles, connecting artists directly to consumers with no overhead costs for the artists. Katie creates images of the flora and fauna of the Southern landscape she knows so well not only because she’s a native, but also because she gave birth to a daughter in Ohio who was upset by the family’s move south to Durham five years ago, when Sean took a job running operations for a firm that services solar farms. “The move was a chance to get back closer to family,” Katie says, “but my daughter was 4 1/2 at the time, and when we moved it was really hard for her. She had a newborn baby brother. We had lived in a great neighborhood in Ohio, and she’d had tons of friends at a great school, and she was uprooted. The way I got started creating these images was at night. When she would go to bed, I would make her these coloring pages, where I would illustrate different native Southeastern flora and fauna. During the day I would have my hands full with the baby, but I would whisper to her, ‘Pssst, I made you some new coloring pages. These are passion flowers. They grow wild here and look like jungle plants.’
“For a long time I resisted doing art professionally. I always saw the art world as something really exclusive,” she adds. “It wasn’t for redneck girls from Cullowhee.” But moving to Ohio made her reconsider the role art could play in her life, and the lives of people both inside and outside the region. “When I moved to Oberlin, people always had all these misconceptions about North Carolina and the South; it’s either Gone with the Wind or Duck Dynasty. Neither of those are authentic to my experience,” she says. This, combined with connecting her daughter to their new home via images of the Southern landscape, inspired Katie to develop a library of images, eventually culminating in a printmaking shop she calls the New South Pattern House. “As parents we’re always trying to curate the best parts of our childhood,” she says. “That’s how I think of my Southern identity with my kids and, frankly, my business. What parts do I want to highlight? We have this incredibly rich biodiversity. We have beautiful, vibrant cities. What are the parts we want to move away from? When people think of Southerners, do I want them to think of the Confederate flag? No, not for me. I want them to think of coneflowers.” OH Wiley Cash is the Alumni Author-in-Residence at the University of North Carolina at Asheville. His new novel, When Ghosts Come Home, is available wherever books are sold.
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O.Henry 31
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Home by Design
Better My Biscuit A mother and daughter come together over a happy meal By Cynthia Adams
Mama was a big reader, and we talked books
until her end. Her bedroom was overtaken by John Grisham novels. Yet cookbooks and cooking became her favorite topics of conversation. Digesting cookbooks is a distinct pleasure. Writer Ruth Reichl beguiled the most reluctant cooks with purring, perfect prose, that lured us into the kitchen. Our family kitchen was a soul-killing level of ugliness, with appliances, counter tops and linoleum flooring all matching in a lurid avocado-green. The wall phone was the color of canned peas. Stark fluorescence meant none of that greenness could hide. Still, Mama failed to see the point of modern, sculptural kitchens — ones with cavernous fridges, sky lights, waterfall counters and commercial stoves “But nobody cooks!” she would splutter. What Mama saw were hot ovens and years spent rolling out biscuit dough and making gravy. Our kitchen was poorly equipped, given that she produced as much food as the equivalent of a small cafeteria: No double ovens nor toaster oven. No microwave, because, well, radiation. The fridge was small, requiring manual defrosting. When the dishwasher died, Dad refused to waste good money repairing it, claiming “we have plenty of dishwashers” — giving us daughters a hard stare. Otherwise liberal, he was a chauvinist pig on the topic of women and cooking, once lamenting I would never marry unless I found a man who did not like to eat. “Or find someone much older,” he advised. “A lot older. He won’t expect you to cook.” Mama had married a man who did expect cooking. On rotation were dishes meant to sate hearty appetites. She made her version of spaghetti sauce, supplemented by glugs of catsup when low on tomato sauce (also deployed in meat loaves that bobbed in bubbling fat). She concocted vats of chow mein, a peculiar church cookbook interpretation no Asian person would recognize. Pot roasts, chicken and “stew beef” were tenderized in a pressure cooker. The Art & Soul of Greensboro
Mostly, Mama fried fish, chicken and pork, seldom draining fat. On Saturday, Dad grilled marbled steaks, giving her a break. By the time Dad’s arteries shut down at age 61, Mama had already moved on, done with life as a short order cook. She later moved to a Cornelius townhouse nearer grandchildren, acquiring a galley kitchen painted a buttery yellow. At 91, Mama now survived on Boost, ice cream sandwiches and dainty cubes of Cheddar cheese impaled on toothpicks. We began bringing her McDonald’s biscuits over her protests. When my brothers visited, she still felt the urge to pull out the rolling pin and make biscuits. Mama grew so slight and weak, she sometimes fell backwards opening the oven. One visit, I mentioned that humorist Rick Bragg was in Athens, Georgia while I was working there, promoting “The Best Cook in the World,” honoring his own mother, Margaret. Mama shot an arch look. “So, I know you don’t think I’m the best cook in the world,” she said, fishing. Clearing my throat, I recited her greatest hits: chocolate cake, ambrosia, corn soup and the McClellan family vegetable soup. “You hate my biscuits,” she accused. “I’m not a biscuit person, Mom,” I said — a rookie mistake. “I’m not either,” she retorted testily, “but that didn’t stop me from getting up and making them for five children. Every. Single. Morning.” Years ago, I blurted out my preference for — wait for it — toast. “Your mother made canned biscuits, because real ones were too much trouble,” I ventured. But Mama was not in a fighting mood. Instead, she laughed over Bragg’s devotion to the cuisine of Possum Trot, Alabama. “You know,” she confided, her voice quaking as if she was about to betray a state secret. “McDonald’s sausage biscuit is really not bad at all. I actually like them.” Her eyes widened. And we collapsed into giggles as if this were easily the funniest joke in all the world. OH Cynthia Adams is a contributing editor to O.Henry. O.Henry 33
Beloved Possessions
The Liberty Cap
By Jim Dodson
“Frankly,”
says John Forbis with a laugh, “it’s been in our family so long I never thought much about it when I was growing up — just that it was passed down through many generations in the family. My father kept it in his sock drawer forever before it migrated to a top shelf in his bedroom closet.” “It” happens to be a simple stocking cap properly known in Colonial days as a “Liberty cap” that belonged to Forbis’s Revolutionary War ancestor, Col. Arthur Forbis. Local lore holds that Forbis — farmer, family man, church elder and Patriot militiaman — fired the first shot at the Battle of Guilford Courthouse on March 15, 1781. There, a mix of local militia and Continental troops under the command of General Nathanael Greene engaged British General Charles Lord Cornwallis and his troops in a day-long fight that hastened the end of the American Revolution. Though Cornwallis technically won a pyrrhic victory, he lost a quarter of his troops and was forced to limp to Wilmington in order to rest and refit his exhausted army. Five months later, outnumbered and outfought, the British General surrendered
34 O.Henry
following a three-week siege at Yorktown, Virginia, bringing the war to a close in favor of the Americans. In 1926, William Forbis, John Forbis’ uncle, presented his Revolutionary ancestor’s sword and knitted stocking cap to the Greensboro History Museum. The cap was probably a homemade affair created from a woman’s loomed silk stocking embroidered with knitted wool, typically worn beneath a soldier’s hat for warmth or a simple reminder of home. It became one of the new museum’s earliest artifacts. Many years later, the historic cap returned to the possession of the Forbis family until John’s father, Arthur Forbis, was persuaded by the late Bill Moore, the museum’s director, to return it to the museum on permanent loan, where it remains on periodic display to this day. “It’s provenance is remarkable and tells a wonderful story,” says Susan Webster, the museum’s Curator of Textiles. “According to our colleagues at the Smithsonian, it may be the only surviving Liberty cap in existence that’s fully intact. That makes it not only extremely rare — but a precious possession that connects 11 generations of a local family to one of the most important events in the nation’s history — the fight for our independence.” Webster explains that the Forbis cap has been intensely researched and debated over the years by a number of leading conservators and textile experts. Careful efforts have been taken The Art & Soul of Greensboro
GREENSBORO HISTORY MUSEUM COLLECTION
A Greensboro family’s surviving link to the Battle of Guilford Courthouse
Beloved Possessions to clean and restore sections of its silk fabric. One intriguing aspect of the cap is what appears to be a darkened section of the cap that was believed to be a bloodstain from a wound Col. Forbis received during the battle. Several forensic teams have tested fibers from the stain, but as of yet are unable to confirm or deny it is actually blood. Arthur Forbis was a father of six children and elder of the Alamance Presbyterian Church, formed in 1762. During the tense days preceding the war, the Piedmont simmered with hostilities between area Tories (loyalists to the Crown) and their Carolina Whig counterparts. In 1775, at age 29, Forbis, credited with being one of the finest marksmen around, joined a local militia formed by Cols. John Paisley and Daniel Gillespie as a captain. According to both legend and documented accounts, Forbis — who received a battlefield promotion to Colonel during the fight — was in the first line of Greene’s troops with the Guilford militia. Before he was severely wounded in the neck and fell, he brought down a British captain approaching on the Old Salisbury Road. “The story I always heard as a kid was that he lay on the battlefield for a couple days,” says John Forbis, “until a man he knew named Shoemaker — a Tory sympathizer — found him and ran a bayonet through his leg and side.”
The Art & Soul of Greensboro
Three days after the battle, as family members began to recover the dead and wounded, the sister of a man who served with Forbis recognized him. She put him on a horse to take him home — only to be met by Forbis’s wife, Bettie, who was making her way to the battlefield. According to family accounts, Dr. David Caldwell attended the gravely wounded man and suggested amputating his leg, but Forbis refused. He died three weeks later and was buried in the Alamance Presbyterian Church Cemetery, where you can see his gravestone today. “I heard the story as a boy growing up on our farm over in Alamance County,” says John Forbis, a former Greensboro mayor and lifelong collector of fine antiques and unique historic artifacts. “But having the cap he wore always gave our family a very personal connection to Arthur Forbis, a living link to his incredible story. You can’t place a value on that. To me, it’s priceless.” OH Do you have a Beloved Possession – priceless or otherwise – that means something important to your family story? We’d love to hear about it and maybe share it with O.Henry’s readers. Email our managing editor at cassie@ohenrymag.com.
O.Henry 35
The Artist’s Eye
Debuting a Culture to America Montagnard-American artist Sachi Dely uses her creative skills to share her experiences with the world
By Allen Siegler
Sachi Dely steps back from one of her
favorite paintings, Refuge, and reflects on the toddler girl on a cotton candy-colored background. A blossoming red flower covers the girl’s mouth, and her face and neck are entwined with plant roots that creep toward her eyes. A small red bird perches on the toddler’s left shoulder, picking at one of the roots on her neck; another flies backwards as it tugs a worm out of the girl’s right ear.
“It was basically about my experience as a refugee,” says Dely, 23. “The birds are taking refuge within me.” Since her sophomore year at Guilford College, Dely has used her art to explore her involuntary exit from the Highlands of
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Vietnam as a 1-year-old. Her works focus on Montagnards, indigenous people from areas mainly within Vietnam’s borders, and how she and they are adapting to Western culture. “There’s the indigenous art they brought with them, but here in their new country there is no tradition of MontagnardAmerican art,” says Andrew Young, Dely’s mentor and a volunteer training coordinator for Guilford’s Bonner Center for Community Service & Learning. “She is embarking on something that has no real background or history.” Dely describes the Montagnard struggle for a place in the world as similar to being “pushed under a rug. If I have the chance to let our community be known about, I’m going to do it . . . I’m proud of my culture. I’m proud of who I am. I want the world to know about us.” Montagnards have lived in the Indochina Highlands for more than 2,000 years. For at least the last 200, both foreign colonialists and Vietnamese authorities in cities like Hanoi and Saigon The Art & Soul of Greensboro
have suppressed Montagnard culture and attempted to seize control of the Highlands. A 2002 U.S. government cultural profile called the relationship between Montagnard and Vietnamese “comparable to the tension between American Indians and the mainstream population in the United States.” The tension deepened after Montagnards aided the U.S. military during the Vietnam War. When Saigon fell to the North Vietnamese communist forces, the new government viewed the Highland tribes as enemies. That was the situation the Delys found themselves in when Sachi was born into her Montagnard Bunong tribe in 1998. When Dely was a year and a half, some Montagnards held a peaceful protest against the Vietnamese government about the right to practice Christianity in an atheist country. “It turned out to be very violent,” Dely says. “The Vietnamese government arrested people and put them in re-education camps. Basically, whoever they arrested, they would torture and ask, ‘Who else was there?’” Although her family didn’t attend the demonstration, the Vietnamese government suspected her father of involvement. He fled their village soon after the protest and trekked to a refugee camp on the Cambodian border. Six months later, Dely and her mother walked for two to three days with hundreds of other Montagnards to the same camp. “My friend remembers being under a bridge and her mom telling her to breathe quietly,” Dely says. “Above the bridge, police were looking for people who were running away.” The Delys spent a few months there until moving to another camp in central Cambodia, uncertain of what the future held. At one point, Dely’s maternal grandfather walked from his village to Cambodia and begged Dely’s mother to return home. “He told her there’s nothing here for you, they’re not going to do anything to you,” Dely recalls. “But there was this man who spoke English really well, and he was like ‘We’re going to America soon. Just stick it out a little longer and we’re gonna go.’” After a year in Cambodia, the U.S. government did, in fact, grant Dely’s family refugee status. They resettled in Greensboro, as have thousands of other Montagnards beginning with 209 in 1986. In her Greensboro art studio, Dely pulls out another painting. A woman, centered on the canvas, is wrapped in a greenpatterned dress and rests a traditional Bunong bow and arrow The Art & Soul of Greensboro
in her left arm. The woman’s right arm is held outstretched and holds a severed head. From the neck up, she is an ox. A tear runs down her cheek. Dely has entitled it Crying Ox. “This was me expressing how I was feeling at the time,” she says. “Like I was just this head on this body that I didn’t understand. I didn’t really understand what it meant to be Bunong.” Despite being raised in a tight-knit Greensboro-based Montagnard community, Dely had trouble connecting with her Bunong identity. “Growing up, I never understood myself or my culture or why I was here,” Dely says, “I got to a point where, being in a public school, I realized ‘Oh, I’m really different than most people,’” “Because she was young [in the camps] and didn’t have all these direct memories, she was shaping her own view of who she was,” reflects Sel Mpang, Dely’s roommate and lifelong O.Henry 37
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The Artist’s Eye friend. Mpang and Dely were part of the same group that walked from the Vietnam Highlands to the Cambodian refugee camp. “She didn’t really talk about those experiences also because they were traumatic.” In January 2020, Dely, her mother and her two younger siblings finally had a chance to return to their Bunong village. There, Dely reunited with aunts, uncles and grandparents who had not seen her in nearly 20 years. “I was expecting myself to be more emotional,” she says. “I thought about it for so long and thought maybe when I get there I’ll cry and have this type of awakening.” Surprisingly, that was not the case: “It was fine. I was there, and I felt very at peace there.” Now, Dely can reflect on Crying Ox from a different perspective. On her return, she looked at her painting and reflected, “Even though a lot of sad things have happened and there’s this whole history, at the end of the day when I was there, my family was just happy and smiling.” One of the last paintings Dely turns to has three scenes. In the top right part of the canvas, a North Carolina neighborhood of shingled-roofed houses glow under a moonlit sky. In the top left, an orange-tinted sun lights up Saigon skyscrapers. The dividing point between the two settings is transformed as it runs down the image. It changes from a line into a river that flows
through the painting’s final section, a village in the Highlands. Dely calls it Home. Home is being used as a poster to promote Fighting for Family, a documentary about a Montagnard refugee who was deported by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to Vietnam without his family. “The idea came from them being so far from each other,” Dely says. “They’re using my prints to sell to help raise money for the family.” Catherine Panter-Brick, an anthropologist and expert on resilience, once said, “What matters to resilience is a sense of hope that life does indeed make sense, despite chaos, brutality, stress, worry or despair.” For Dely, that sense of hope comes from her creative expression and how it can help her community. “My purpose in life is to be creative and to pull my culture and my ethnic group out into the public,” she says. “I also think it’s to be a teacher . . . teaching about my culture, teaching about creativity, incorporating both, and being more than what the Western eye sees us to be.” OH Allen Siegler is a freelance journalist based in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. His works have appeared in Indy Week, North Carolina Health News and The San Diego Union-Tribune.
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Botanicus
Rhododendron Therapy A cure for grumpy old men
By Ross Howell Jr.
This time of year in Blowing Rock, when
visitors jam sidewalks, hiking trails and trout streams, a grumpy old regular like myself can start to nurse a grievance. Midst the bustle, I resent the tourists’ mutts all sporting better haircuts than mine. Then, like the Balm of Gilead, rhododendrons turn grievance to delight. The rhododendrons paint neighborhood streets, parks, escarpments and hollows with purple, pink or orange hues. Listen, and you hear the drone of pollinators. Lean close, and you savor the delicate fragrance. “I shall never forget so long as I live the day we discovered that plant,” John Fraser Jr. commented to the biographer of his father, John Sr., the Scottish botanist credited with finding and cataloging hundreds of North American native species. In 1799 young Fraser accompanied his father on his sixth voyage across the Atlantic, another expedition in search of plants that could be taken back to England, propagated and sold through the family business. “We had been for a long time traveling among the mountains,” Fraser said, in “a fog so dense that we could not see further than a yard before us.” As the Frasers reached what was likely the peak of Big Bald
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Mountain, “the fog began to clear away, and the sun to shine out brightly,” Fraser continued. “The first object that attracted our eye … was a large quantity of Rhododendron catawbiense in full bloom.” In natural areas the extent of the rhododendron thickets — sometimes called “hells,” a term that quickly feels apt if you’ve ever tried to make your way through one — can be surprising, especially given the dizzying slopes the thickets often cover. Rhododendrons are especially effective at colonizing places that are — well, between a rock and a hard place. After a rockslide, for example, they will be among the first plants to take root in the rubble and debris. Each year Grandfather Mountain hosts an event called “The Remarkable Rhododendron Ramble,” a celebration of summer, when guides lead guests on 20-minute hikes to observe the splendid array of blooms and learn about the history, characteristics and importance of rhododendrons in the mountain’s varied ecological domains. This year the daily Rambles are scheduled for 2 p.m. from May 28 through June 4. The culminating event, according to Landis Taylor, assistant vice president of marketing and communications with the Grandfather Mountain Stewardship Foundation, is an “All-Day Rhodo Ramble on June 5.” Activities that day include 20-minute Rambles on the hour starting at noon through 3 p.m., along with kids’ crafts, information tables and “a special presentation given by a staff naturalist who specializes in botany,” Taylor adds. All these programs are included in the regular price of park admission. Since there is nearly a 1,000-foot change in elevation from The Art & Soul of Greensboro
Botanicus Grandfather Mountain’s base to its peak, visitors have a wide window of opportunity to see rhododendrons in bloom in different park locations. Most plentiful on the mountain is the same one first noted by the Frasers more than 200 years ago, the -(R. catawbiense). Its deep purple blossoms appear from early to mid-June — depending upon the elevation — and can be found all along Grandfather Mountain’s trails and main road. But there are other native species that can also be seen. The pink-shell azalea (R. vaseyi) has a delicate pink blossom and can be found growing on the mountain in late April or early May, just before the Rhododendron Ramble. It can be seen at the Half Moon overlook, as well as at the Forrest Gump Curve picnic area. Rosebay rhododendron (R. maximum) displays very light pink flowers and typically blooms in late June, though usually a few
show blossoms during the Rhododendron Ramble. Linville Bluffs, across the park’s main road from the Wilson Center for Nature Discovery, is a prime spot to take them in. But to my mind, the most spectacular of the rhododenrons is the flame azalea (R. calendulaceum), ranging in color from yellow to orange to peach or red. You can see it at Grandfather Mountain’s entrance gate and at Split Rock in late May through July. See? I haven’t written a single disparaging word about doggy haircuts. Rhododendron therapy works. OH Ross Howell Jr. lives in Greensboro but spends a fair amount of time in Blowing Rock. For more information, visit www.grandfather.com/theremarkable-rhododendron-ramble/.
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Birdwatch
Stranger in Town Mississippi kite finds new regions
By Susan Campbell
Seldom do we hear of good news when it
comes to the status of our migrant bird populations. But there are species that are actually expanding their ranges as a result of human alteration of habitats. The Mississippi kite here in the Southeast is one. This is a handsome raptor of wooded terrain that feeds mainly on large insects. It was found breeding in the floodplain of the Roanoke River in the late 1980s. The next region where it was detected happened to be here in the Sandhills. And now it can be found in the Triad as well as other locations in the Piedmont and the Coastal Plain.
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These are small, sleek raptors that are very maneuverable. Adults are a mix of gray and black with long, tapered wings, a relatively long, squared-off tail and a delicate, hooked bill. Immature birds are streaked brown with barred tails. They are birds built to catch rapidly moving, aerial prey. Grasshoppers, beetles, dragonflies and even bats are targets when hunting. They also feed low to the ground when small reptiles and mammals are abundant. In late summer, as they are preparing to head south, large flocks can be seen foraging over large open areas such as farm fields where flying insects are abundant. Although they breed here, Mississippi kites winter in South America. As well-studied as the species has been in the United States, little is known about them after they leave. Although they collect in large groups in the south-central U.S. and travel to southern Brazil and northern Argentina, their ecology is a question mark. But we have good data on the Midwestern and Southeastern populations, both of which are expanding. Everything from increases in pasture lands, golf courses and parks adjacent to mature woodlands are providing opportunities for nesting. O.Henry 43
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Birdwatch An increase in nesting around human habitation means an increase in kite interactions with people. And this can actually be problematic. Mississippi kites are very aggressive when it comes to defending their nests and young. I have been on the receiving end of warning whistles given by territorial individuals a number of times. Furthermore, they will readily dive bomb perceived threats — and this includes humans. I was very startled one summer several years ago to not only observe a new family on the farm where I was living in Southern Pines, but to also be buzzed by one of the adults. I was shocked by how quickly I was attacked and how close the bird came to my head. A very effective defensive maneuver for sure! Late in the summer, kites will amass at rich foraging sites before they migrate southward. These sites may be north or west of the breeding grounds. Dozens can be seen alternately soaring and wheeling around above farm fields where an abundance of large insects such as grasshoppers, locusts, and beetles are found. If you happen upon one of these locations, it is quite a sight to see. For whatever reason, few areas consistently attract kites from year to year. One spot that is reliable in the N.C. foothills (oddly enough, since they do not breed there) is Irma’s Produce fields in McDowell County —right along I-40. If you are passing in late July or early August, it is well worth a stop. Not only do the birds put on quite a show, but I hear that Irma’s fruits and veggies are a treat as well. There is much interest in documenting nesting Mississippi kites here in North Carolina. Should you know of a nest site or see adults or immature kites in the next few months, please drop me an email. These are beautiful and fascinating birds and certainly worthy of special attention. OH Susan Campbell would love to hear about your wildlife sightings and receive your photos. She can be contacted by email at susan@ ncaves.com or by phone at (910-585-0574).
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The Art
of Living
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Wandering Billy
June is Busking Out All Over! Cuttin’ up With Colin Cutler By Billy Eye
“When I first came to Nashville, people hardly gave country music any respect. We lived in old cars and dirty hotels, and we ate when we could.” — Loretta Lynn
Colin Cutler is one of those individu-
als who devoted his life to music from an early age. Like many who choose that path, his passion started at church. “I was 5 years old,” he tells me. “Mom put me up in front of the congregation to sing an Amy Grant song, ‘Angels Watching Over Me.’” He was 9 when he picked up the trumpet, played that until about 16, then mastered the guitar. “I wanted to be a metal head like, you know, Eddie Van Halen,” Cutler says. “In college, I got into more acoustic music. One of the guys I was doing chapel music with had been in a Bluegrass band down in Raleigh. I figured out that the writing I was doing fit that music a lot better.” Cutler moved to Greensboro from Virginia in 2014 to attend UNCG, aiming for an M.A. in English which he completed at Fort Bliss while serving with his National Guard unit, releasing his first album, Nelson County Wayside, just before deployment to Qatar and Romania. Having written short stories and poetry since his teen years, Cutler realized, “Songs are just poetry put to music.” He says, “And I’ve always loved great songwriters — Paul Simon, Johnny Cash, Hank Williams, the songs that Patsy Cline wrote or chose for herself.” Ultimately this bushy-haired musician decided he’d rather fly solo, for the most part anyway. “I’m about 23 or so when I saw Kelly Wills, who does a lot of my graphic design, playing a clawhammer banjo and I was like, that’s what I want to do. That’s a very Piedmont style of banjo.” Instead of falling into the local bluegrass scene, Cutler found himself in Greensboro’s Old Time scene.
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Whereas bluegrass is dependent on an entire band to weave melodies, clawhammer style is like a simultaneous blend of melody and rhythm, very similar to flat-picked guitar. As Eye understand it, clawhammer differs from three-finger-style-guitar picking because the strings are being hammered, using the thumb and the back of the index or middle fingernail, making the hand look claw-like. Our very own multiple Grammy-winning artist Rhiannon Giddens plays clawhammer banjo in the Old Time music style. Old Time was developed in the late 1800s into the ’20s and ’30s, whereas bluegrass didn’t really gain popularity until the 1940s. “UNCG has the Old Time Ensemble, and the Piedmont Old Time Society is based in Greensboro,” Cutler notes. “The Triad, with its proximity to the Blue Ridge, is a hub for the traditional clawhammer banjo-driven, Old Time music, which is a more rhythmic style than the finger-picking of bluegrass, a sound more predominant in the Triangle.” You may have encountered Colin Cutler playing and singing while out in public. “I busk quite a bit,” Cutler says. “I started cutting my teeth playing at the farmers markets when I was living up in Virginia.” Recently he’s been busking at the Corner Market in Lindley Park (it has since moved to Sunset Hills), the Curb Market on Yanceyville and the Cobblestone Farmers Market in Winston. “Actually, that’s how I met my girlfriend.” The art of busking goes back to ancient days. Many centuries ago, Geoffrey Chaucer captured that spirit in The Canterbury Tales, a grand tradition of troubadours wandering hither and yon, sharing stories and songs. “It’s a moment of vulnerability and intimacy that isn’t available when you’re on a stage,” he tells me. Cutler compares it to church bells, sort of setting a surroundsound rhythm: “The music is there for anyone who needs it or O.Henry 47
Wandering Billy wants it, and it’s often a pleasant surprise what you get back from it.” This summer Colin Cutler is spearheading the East of Nashville in the Round series in The Crown at the Carolina Theatre. “We’ve got it lined up monthly through September,” he tells me. “Basically a diverse group of songwriters from all over the region, a couple of locals and a couple of out-of-towners for each show.” Cutler’s June 19 event at The Crown will bring together Momma Molasses from Bristol, Tennessee, Greensboro local Matty Sheets and Emmanuel Winter out of Charlotte. “That’ll be a cool mix,” Cutler says. “Emmanuel’s a bit more of a jazzy violin player who does a lot of looping and stuff. Matty’s very roots-based, but also moves into rock ‘n’ roll and punk. He’s very much a mainstay of the local scene.” Having recorded an untold number of albums, the ubiquitous Matty Sheet’s Open Mic Night, currently at The Green Bean downtown
every Tuesday night, has been a local tradition for decades. “There’ll be musicians up on stage in the round. After one person plays one of their songs, the next person does their song and so on. Usually about a third or halfway through they get a feel for each other and start cracking jokes and telling stories. It’s a good time.” Of special interest to me is Momma Molasses — aka Ella Patrick — a singersongwriter originally from Carthage in Moore County, North Carolina, where she immersed herself in Piedmont Blues. She describes her style as, “Warbling county-folk, tear-in-your-beer ballads; toetapping, finger-picking and sweet soundin’.” Momma Molasses’ County Folk style is about as twangy as music gets, with loads of clutch-poppin’ fun, while at the same time conveying a level of sweet intimacy. Her rolling contralto warbling has been compared to Mother Maybelle Carter and early Janis Joplin. Check her out on ReverbNation.
&
In 2021, Colin Cutler released his latest album, Hot Pepper Jam. I asked about the significance of that title. “I did a lot of gardening when I was up in Virginia and then when I moved down here,” Cutler says. “And everything died but the hot pepper plants.” With an abundant crop, he began jamming in a different way to pass the time during the shutdown. Thanks to a grant from Arts Greensboro, a new album is in the works for this fall, a collection of tunes based on Flannery O’Connor short stories. “It will be more acoustic, more towards blues rock. I’ve had a lot of interest from Flannery O’Connor scholars.” In fact, in May he sang some of his songs in the Greensboro Bound Literary Festival. In addition to playing at East of Nashville in the Round at the The Crown on June 19 and July 17, Cutler — as he does periodically — will pull together a full band to perform at Gardens at Gray Gables in Summerfield on June 29. Earlier in June on the 22nd, he will be playing solo at Foothills Brewery in Winston-Salem. I’ll do my best to be there to enjoy the great chow, the laidback atmosphere, Cutler’s clawhammering vibes and the crisp acoustics. OH This month Billy Eye releases a new book about Greensboro past and present, Eye on GSO, a compendium of past Wandering Billy columns from the last six years in O.Henry. Available at amazon.com or through your favorite bookstore.
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O.Henry 49
June 2022 Diving for the Anchor When you were my living father, I thought of you as you, alone. Now that you’re long dead, I think of you and me as us, together, not that we were closer than most fathers and sons who can’t say what should be said, the unspoken words between them a great gauzy silence ever after, as on the moonless night we fished the Miles River, a tributary of the Chesapeake, skidding our johnboat into an early autumn’s slacking, our fishing rods angled on the gunnels. Nettles billowed the pilings, cottonwood and locust sapped the brackish air as the lulling water swirled us into an outgoing tide, tugging us midstream where you tossed the anchor overboard and heard it splash, no chain securing it to the boat, the lead shank long gone in deep water. “We’ve lost the damn anchor!” you swore to high heaven, and as the outwash eddied us bayward you stripped off your shirt, shoes, and shorts and dove in, roiling the dark water to gulp you under into perfect oblivion, leaving the child I was alone with night sounds — a screaky covert of moorhens, cicada crescendos, the coo and stutter of a cormorant — and I knew, at that moment, you were the bravest man who ever lived. I could feel your fingers probing the busted soda bottles, tangled tackle, and rusting beer cans, groping amid the grass eels, hogfish, and bristle worms. I held the longest breath I’d ever held and prayed, prayed, for your deliverance, and mine. And sure enough the surface riffled, the waters parted, and you burst foaming into still air, anchor in hand, and clacked it onto the sloshing deck, pulling yourself free of the current, your body slick with river slime, and grasping the oarlock, rolled into the rocking boat.
I sighed my only true sigh, longing for the wisdom you’d dredged from the foulest netherworld, testimony that life is more than the taking in and letting out of breath by a father and son adrift beneath a thin haze of stars. Having plumbed dead bottom, you’d been resurrected to impart a consoling truth, a glistening coin I could tuck in the pocket of memory. You obliged: “Wish I had a nickel,” you said, “for every kid who’s pissed in this river.” — Stephen E. Smith Stephen E. Smith's most recent book is A Short Report on the Fire at Woolworths.
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The Art & Soul of Greensboro
MILLENNIAL
Plant Passion Turning Over Every Leaf in Search of the Perfect “It” Plant By Cynthia Adams Photographs by Bert VanderVeen
O
ne early Saturday in June 2020, Greensboro’s Plants and Answers parking lot began filling before opening. Longtime manager Pat Fogleman couldn’t believe her eyes. She phoned owner Larry Richardson. “Get somebody over here to help me,” Fogleman entreated. “There were 20 people lined up outside the door,” he recalls. Young adults streamed in, heading for the greenhouse. Richardson discovered a Raleigh millennial had posted their greenhouse purchase days earlier. “It’s a hobby. It’s a collecting thing,” marvels Richardson. “They’re proud parents! Sometimes they’ll pull out their phone and say, ‘Let me show you my pet’.” Their “pet” is a house plant. Monsteras. Calatheas. Anthuriums. Rex begonias. Hoyas. Call them Hoya Heads. Call them Plant Parents. (Names they call themselves.) In April, Greenhouse Product News reported that “Millennials’ current buying power equates to $200 billion, with indirect spending reaching $500 billion.” Ashley Cox, 27, goes by @reineforest_ on social media and lives in a Greensboro studio apartment. There she tends an estimated 200 indoor and outdoor plants — amassed since 2019. “As I started collecting house plants, I started making friendships with plant YouTubers,” Cox explains. Her boyfriend began growing hot peppers, and they bottled their own hot sauce, as well as making kombucha and floral teas. This year, she began studying horticulture and expanding their container gardening. The Art & Soul of Greensboro
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R aelyn Pinion-R aby with her favorite plant, Anthurium luxurians. But don’t tell her others.
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Millennials (age 26-41) are the largest group of plant collectors, followed by Gen Zers (age 10-25). Such big passions net big dollars. In April, The New York Times described a houseplant resurgence. “Plant sales for all kinds of varieties have surged over the past few years,” wrote Katie Van Syckle. “About 38 million households in the United States participate in indoor houseplant gardening and spent about $1.67 billion in 2020, an increase of 28 percent from 2019.” Like the 1634 Dutch tulip mania, and Victorian era “orchidelirium,” collecting rare plants still requires tracking exotics. The Orchid Thief, Susan Orleans’s 1998 book, revealed hunters poaching rare orchids in a Florida State Preserve. It was a big screen hit 20 years ago. But a passion for plants persists. Van Syckle describes plant hunters dispatched to the wilds of 60 countries searching out the increasingly rare and Instagram-worthy. As for the Millennial collectors? They aren’t poaching. They’re buying, tending and posting their finds. Van Syckle describes the “avid rare plant collectors and influencers who covet specific varieties the way others might seek out sneakers, watches or whiskey, and display their collections with similar pride.” Christina Larson, who acquired Guilford Garden Center near Guilford College five years ago, observes this sort of thing daily. She notices ever-younger customers, “especially the Millennials.” Larson cites young buyers’ attraction to her center’s “Urban Jungle,” (also the name of Larson’s Instagram post). Tyler Lee, 30, has an Etsy-based business and works part time at Plants and Answers. There, he talks with many who discuss “becoming a plant parent.” Like Cox, he amassed 100 pandemic plants. Lee describes the joy of seeing the first new leaf “on a plant I’ve
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been pouring time, energy and water into for months.” He discovered pride and happiness in helping them “thrive and flourish” during lockdown. “Plants don’t care about what chaos is going on outside their pots. As long as they get their sun and water, they just keep growing, which is absolutely amazing.” Some theorize that Millennials, confined during COVID, suffered from “nature deficit disorder” — an actual phenomenon. Lacking a garden space, they nurtured house plants while expressing concern for the planet. Millennials prioritized their plants’ needs — morning feedings and watering — before logging online. “My thinking is, they stayed inside and became aware of how vital plants were to the environment,” Richardson speculates. So does Larson. Ironically, collectors’ second favorite pastime is posting about their plants. “We had a lot of rare and unusual things because it’s my passion, too — and (a young customer) said, ‘Oh, my God, I never knew about you! You have Swiss cheese philodendron!’” says Richardson. She posted the philodendron on Facebook. The next day, new buyers arrived. She was a plant influencer. “We had people come in from Lenoir, from Sparta, from Roanoke,” recalls Richardson. “Distances! They said they were plant moms, and they showed me pictures of collections of plants.” Larson, a former plant hobbyist herself before retiring from the restaurant business, understands how social media influencers plant a seed of desire. Nor is Larson immune, either. “What’s happened is, it is sort of catching. And because I see my customer’s intoxication with rare plants, I’ll also go look at O.Henry 55
Oh, the plants you’ll grow! Tyler Lee with his Pseudobombax ellipticum, aka “Dr. Seuss Tree”
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other garden centers when I travel to see what’s unusual.” “The last two years have been incredible,” Richardson adds, having feared the pandemic would destroy business. “Now, the Millennials account for almost 50 percent of our retail business. The average age of our clientele are the 20 and 30 somethings!” “I’ve had wealthy clients who collected rare orchids,” he says. “But Millennials sometimes prefer plants that are easy to care for and are rewarding. They love hoyas. They love philodendrons — simpler to grow than the exotics — and succulents, cacti, calathea.” Guilford Garden Center’s customer base contains Millennials. “A significant number,” answers Larson, “and it’s still growing. But I see younger kids coming in.” She mentions a younger than usual customer. A Gen Zer. “A 10-year-old brought his family in. All he wanted for his birthday was a yucca plant for his bedroom. How interesting is that?!” Larson exclaims. An expensive plant — an $80 one, she mentions. “Never had I seen this in someone that young.” Larson echoes something Richardson said. Do not underestimate their youthful passion or knowledge. “They can be preteen and know species names. They know the botanical names,” she marvels. Larson’s repeat customers, especially Millennials, are “looking for the latest philodendron or calatheas.”
The Art & Soul of Greensboro
What drives this green obsession? She muses. “I don’t know…maybe Instagram. TikTok?” Larson believes “social media is at play. If you search #urbanjungle, you see others who have an extensive, beautiful home, with rooms filled with plants.” Raelyn Pinion-Raby, who lives in Winston Salem with a 200-plant collection, repeats this theme. “Plants gave me something to ‘mother’ and brought me so much joy and happiness in a time when I was really struggling and was unsure of what was to come for me and my family.” She has since purchased a home with extra room for plants and connected to an online community of plant enthusiasts. Pinion-Raby, who goes by @plantwithrae, confides her favorite “is probably my Anthurium luxurians (but don’t tell my other plants).” Through pollination, she has “begun making little hybrid babies!” There is a prevailing phenomenon of “plant parenting,” Larson notices. Millennials and Gen Zers “can have pets and plants and parent those. It’s a different approach to things and life.” All of which has affected Larson’s buying and merchandising. Larson expanded their Urban Jungle “from about a fourth of one room being house plants to them spilling over into the main room…and now filling a third of it. Constantly scouring sources to find the latest, greatest. Rarity has a price.
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“There are special philodendrons, like the Pink Princess,” Larson explains. “Which I’ve heard going for as much as $500 for a 4-inch plant!” As for the “It” plant of the moment, it depends upon whom you ask. According to Richardson, “It” is the fruiting trees. Or olive trees. Or Ficus Daniela or Ficus Moclame. All of which have unusual leaf shapes. While working with the showroom designers at the spring High Point furniture market, Richardson observed something. An indicator of things to come — or go? The fiddle leaf fig was gone from stylish showrooms. Displaced by the White Bird of Paradise. “Strelitzia regina,” he says. “It gave them a strikingly different look.” Larson personally avoids plants like the orchid which “have become such a commodity.” Commodity plants hold little Millennial appeal. “With the exception of the rare,” Larson stresses. “We had a ground orchid, a paphiopedilum, flown in from Hawaii. A terrestrial. It looks like a pitcher plant.” Not cheap, but not in the stratosphere either. “They go for around $50,” she says. Distributors have begun rationing allocations of rare plants to resellers, Richardson says. “They sell out sometimes in hours.” Less exotics still appeal though. “Snake plants. They sell well. Easy to take care of. And the Ficus elastica, the rubber tree.” The spider plant has ecological value. “They are one of those that rates the highest for cleaning air,” Richardson says. “The Millennials have researched taking the toxicity out of the air — from dry cleaning, pollutants.” And, always, hoyas. “Just Instagram #hoyaheads! People still love hoyas,” he says. Jessica Corbett, 33, is a self-confessed Hoya Head in Greensboro. “My Nana loved plants and my mom gave me one of her pothos at the end of 2020.” This “sparked a passion.” Corbett’s favorite remains the hoya, “and all variations of them.” Jenna Lawner, 31, is a Jamestown nature lover. “Being outside in nature has always been therapeutic for me,” she says. “Being surrounded by [plants] and caring for them is calming and has helped tremendously with my depression.” She resumed collecting in 2020, when her youngest
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Plant happy Jenna Lawner with her Philodendron hastatum, aka “silver sword”
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Danielle Dunn went from ordering Uber Eats to ordering Philodendrons. Here she is with her Philodendron Squamiferum.
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child matured. “In a matter of a few months my collection exploded.” Lawner is reluctant to play favorites, but . . . “I’m not sure if I could pick a specific favorite, but I do especially love philodendrons.” Danielle Dunn, a 32-year-old living in Greensboro, once feared her grandmother’s spider plant was spider infested. Ironically, she bought one as the quarantine began “and that’s when the madness started.” Dunn went from “ordering burgers on Uber Eats to ordering philodendrons.” Now she has a “jungle vibe” in a one-bedroom apartment. “Watching something so small grow and develop into something so large is the most amazing thing to me,” she says. “Have you ever seen a bird of paradise leaf unfurl? It’s mind-blowing. It starts so small and then pops open to a big leaf. It literally makes a popping sound.” Like any equitable parent, “All my plants are my favorite, but Bridget has been getting a lot of my attention.” Bridget? “She’s a polka-dot begonia, nothing too rare and crazy, but Bridget is classy, beautiful and tall.” Recently, customers, er, plant parents, were clamoring for packaged moss, puzzling Richardson. “Turns out, the big thing is to make totem poles with it to make something for your hoyas to climb up.” OH
Cynthia Adams is a contributing editor.
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A Rose in Bloom
An Abstract Painter finds inspiration — and herself — in the natural world By Ross Howell Jr. • Photographs by Rebecka VanderVeen
“I
t looks rough now, but it will be beautiful this summer,” says artist Angel Rose Barker, standing on the porch overlooking her Fisher Park backyard. Barker, who goes by Angie, points out beds of daffodils and hellebores. Mature hardwoods rim the lot. “When they leaf out, there’s a lot of shade,” Barker says. Near the porch are ceramic containers, large and small. “A lot of them we’ll move up here,” Barker says. “This porch really gets blasted by the sun.” She and her husband, Michael Sage, have been gardening here
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for three years. “I wanted Sage to have a hobby away from the computer,” Barker says. “He’s a software developer.” Originally grass, the yard had nothing to attract pollinators. “The first year Sage figured out he could use one of my detail brushes to pollinate the tomato flowers,” Barker says. “And we got tomatoes.” She praised her husband’s resourcefulness. “I told him that was fascinating,” she continues. “But next year we have to get flowers.” Barker feels she inherited her interest in gardening from her
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grandfathers. One, a Polish émigré, grew roses in a Chicago suburb. Another grew vegetables on an acre plot. “They could just get lost in gardening,” Barker explains. “And that’s how I feel.” Taking me into her home studio, Barker shows me examples of a recent series of paintings. “I dive deep into my feelings when I’m creating these works,” she says. “They’re like a meditation for that day.” She calls them “Flora,” and they’re bright color abstracts painted on large, organically shaped wood panels made in Burlington and hand-cut by a friend. Barker explains that she started working on shaped wood panels when she began thinking about how constrictive framed, four-sided canvases are. “My favorite quote is from playwright Henrik Ibsen,” Barker says.
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“‘A forest bird never wants a cage.’” “These wood panel paintings are free to move around,” she continues. “They feel alive.” As with her gardening, Barker is self-taught in her use of color. Her B.F.A. from Appalachian State University is in graphic design. “As an undergrad, I did a lot of pen-and-ink drawings,” Barker says. “All black-and-white.” When she started expressing herself with color, she painted with deep blues and purples, in what she calls her “dark and moody period.” “I feel my work has completely changed,” Barker says. “Now it’s a more effulgent palette, like there’s a radiance coming through the paintings.” Barker shows me a wood panel called Flora: The Bloom. She tells me it’s inspired by the flowers she’s grown in her garden. Another panel is entitled Flora: Who I’m Meant To Be. Barker smiles. “I finally realized who I wanted to be when I got into this series,” she says. “It’s funny how understanding the theory and science behind color can completely change your perspective on life. Being surrounded by color all the time, I feel more joyful.” OH Angie Barker also produces commissioned art. Visit her website, www.angietherose.com, or follow her on Instagram @angietherose. Ross Howell Jr. is a freelance writer in Greensboro.
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Happy Campers
Greensboro native Alice Zealy remodels recreational vehicles with verve By Maria Johnson • Photographs by Amy Freeman
R
elaxing on a pale turquoise sofa under a window that frames a soothing mosaic of tree leaves, Alice Zealy and Eric Ellington are the picture of domestic tranquility. Across the room, a 50-inch flat-screen TV murmurs country music videos. A ruddy dog named Ruby snoozes on the couch beside Zealy. A larger black-and-white pup named Dega — as in NASCAR’s Talladega Superspeedway — sprawls on a faux-fur dog bed that meshes perfectly with the room’s tealwhite-and-gold color scheme. Zealy describes the couple’s aesthetic as sleek, modern and whimsical. A slim round antique table, adorned with a band of metal filagree, stands nearby. Colorful fish swim across the wall. Two clear, acrylic bar seats snuggle up to a counter. A gilded sunburst mirror reflects the morning sun. It matters little to the couple that their home encompasses a grand total of 350 square feet, rolls on wheels and hitches neatly into the bed of a hulking GMC pickup truck. “This is probably my favorite home ever,” Zealy says, smiling at Ellington. “Me, too,’ says Ellington, smiling back. They’re two happy campers. Zealy started her business, Rain2Shine Ventures, earlier this year. Her public — meaning her Instagram and Facebook followers — fairly demanded it after she spent much of COVID’s darkest days remodeling her own camper and posting starkly different before and after pictures. “I got about 2,000 likes and shares,” says Zealy, 40, a Greensboro native. “People were saying, ‘This is the nicest remodel I’ve ever seen. It should be in a magazine.’” Followers drooled over her kitchen and bath upgrades. Zealy kept most of the original dark wood cabinetry, but transformed it by sanding, priming and using an industrial paint gun to spray on several coats of gleaming white acrylic latex. Dingy vinyl wallpaper got the same treatment. Up came the ratty, beige carpet. Down went luxury vinyl plank flooring in driftwood gray. Counters were resurfaced and, in the case of the breakfast bar, fitted with hinged Corian leaves. Out went the skimpy stainless-steel sinks and dated faucets — The Art & Soul of Greensboro
in went a porcelain farmhouse sink with gooseneck faucet in the kitchen, while the bathroom got a stylish waterfall faucet and glass vessel sink. Zealy installed tile backsplashes in both rooms and decked the bathroom floor with gold-trimmed porcelain tile. Real tile, which some RV renovators eschew because of the heft. Never mind the weight of real tile, Zealy says. Just take out some of the heavy, bolted-down furniture that most campers come with. “Every camper we’ve ever done, we’ve never put back in as much weight as we’ve taken out,” she says, implying the upward trajectory of her business. Last month, she was renovating her sixth and seventh clients — quite an accomplishment considering that she had never set foot inside a camper until she was 30 years old. She came from a “house” family. Her father, Sam, was a partner in Wrenn, Zealy and Kirkman, a Greensboro real estate and property management business. Her mother, Jane “Peppermint” Zealy, was a second grade teacher with a keen eye for interior design. Daughter Alice spent summers helping the family business by cutting grass, sweeping stairwells and managing yard sales stocked with the belongings of vanished and banished renters. As a sideline in high school, she made jewelry for family and friends. After taking design courses at N.C. State and UNCG, she worked at the Belk department store in Friendly Center. She started by selling shoes, worked her way up to management and found her bliss in visual merchandizing. She also incorporated her jewelry business, Alice’s Chic Boutique, which caught the eyes of vendors who supplied gift suites for the Emmy and Golden Globe awards. They invited her to design jewelry that would be given to celebrities. “The idea is that someone wears your jewelry, they tweet about it and you get the brand awareness,” Zealy says. Actress Angela Bassett, an Emmy nominee in 2013, wore one of Zealy’s pieces, a lacy black cut-out necklace, at a benefit gala that year. The Hollywood exposure earned Zealy a few minutes of fame. The local newspaper and a couple of television stations sent O.Henry 69
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reporters to interview her. A woman approached Zealy in Friendly Center and asked if her distinctive necklace was a piece by Alice. “Uhhh, yeah,” said Zealy, who was taken aback. “I’m Alice.” “Oh, my God!” swooned the woman. Zealy laughs at the memory, putting a hand to her chest in mock admiration of herself. “I was like, ‘Am I the Michael Kors of Greensboro?’” she says, invoking the name of a popular jewelry designer. Zealy led a comfortable existence. She and her then-husband lived in a 3,700-square-foot home with a swimming pool off Westridge Road. They traveled frequently in a camper, the first one Zealy had ever set foot in, to watch NASCAR races. When the couple split, he bought her share of the camper. Not knowing what she wanted to do — other than be free to travel — Zealy took the settlement and bought another camper that was advertised on Facebook Marketplace. By then, she had visited 20-some campers in-person and had viewed hundreds online. Ellington went with her to check out a 2003 Holiday Rambler, a so-called fifth wheel because the trailer attaches to a U-shaped hitch, or fifth wheel, in the bed of a truck. Inside, the camper was — to use Zealy’s word — nasty. Surfaces were yellowed by cigarette smoke. The carpet was stained and reeked of dog waste. But structurally the camper was in good shape, and the motorized slides that expanded the trailer sideways when parked — two slides in the living room and one in the bedroom — worked fine. “It’s a really well-built piece,” says Ellington, 58, a NASCAR team veteran who owns Ellington Rod & Custom, a shop that builds street-legal hot rods in Archdale. Zealy sealed the camper deal with $7,500 cash in February 2020,
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and they towed the Rambler to Ellington’s shop, where Zealy worked for six or seven months to transform the camper into the RV of her dreams. Ellington, her new partner in life and work, made sure the mechanical, electrical and plumbing systems functioned well, while Zealy exercised her artistic ability. “I got the freedom to do what I wanted to do,” she says. Ellington supported her, expecting that he would enjoy the outcome. “I said, ‘Whatever you want to do,’” he says. “I make things pretty, and he makes things work,” she adds. “But I’ve learned a lot. I can make things work now, too.” “Absolutely,” he says, smiling at her. Zealy took her time, carefully documenting her improvements on Facebook and posting links to the sources of her material. She felt no pressure to wrap up. “There was nowhere to go because of COVID,” she explains. When she finished the transformation, she and Ellington ditched their plan to buy land in the country, install electrical and plumbing hook-ups for the camper and eventually build a house on the property. They decided to live in the camper. Full time. They rented an annual spot and a bought a membership in the Thousand Trails campground in Advance, near the Yadkin River.
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The campground — which boasts two swimming pools, volleyball courts and horse trails — is part of a national chain of campgrounds. They can afford to travel more. Their scaled-down lifestyle sips income. Monthly expenses run $350 to $400, says Ellington. He’s elated at the change. He used to live on a small farm in Gibsonville. “If I wasn’t working at the shop, I was feeding horses and chickens, and bush-hogging pastures, and getting up hay,” he says. “I always wanted to go and see.” Now, he and Zealy are part of a recreational vehicle boom that started before COVID and gained steam during the pandemic. Camping allowed for social distancing, and more people worked from home, wherever that happened to be. “If the job allows you to, why wouldn’t you?” says Zealy. “You see more young people, rather than retired people, coming into campers and vans now . . . This generation — I call them the Instagram Generation — they want the experiences.” “They want good pictures,” Ellington adds with a smile. Zealy sensed an appetite for splashier RV interiors, and she saw that very few businesses specialized in that kind of design. Some RV repair shops offered remodeling, she says, but fashionable upgrades were not their forte, and they charged more than she intended to. As COVID waned, Zealy launched her business. The Art & Soul of Greensboro
She named it Rain2Shine Ventures after the nicknames that her father, Sam, who died in 2007, gave her and her sister, Mary Knox: Rainbow and Sunshine, respectively. “He would have loved to be here, doing this with me,” Zealy says. “He was Mister Handy. He could do just about anything.” She carries on his spirit in her work. “There’s times when I’m out there, in the campers by myself, that I talk to him,” she says. For a young couple in Wagram, N.C., she’s upfitting a Winnebago with heavy duty dog kennels. The couple will use the vehicle to transport rescue dogs. “My goal is to make it nice enough that they can do adoption fairs on the bus,” says Zealy, a supporter of the rescue organization. “We’ll paint and do little paw prints. It’ll be beautiful. I want it to be happy.” For another customer, a friend, she’s reviving a tiny, Britishmade 1969 Sprite camper. “It was just a hull of parts,” says Ellington, describing the vintage trailer’s condition when Zealy’s friend bought it. “I think she gave $250 for it.” “It’s gonna be adorable,” Zealy promises. Sitting in her favorite home, she’s as radiant as a rainbow. OH Maria Johnson is a contributing editor of O.Henry. Email her at ohenrymaria@gmail.com
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Arts & Culture
C.P. LOGAN “IN THE GREENHOUSE!” • 30” X 40” • ORIGINAL OIL CONNIE P. LOGAN - ARTIST/TEACHER
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A L M A N A C
June
By Ashley Walshe
J
une holds nothing back. Dripping with decadence, she drapes her frills and trimmings across limbs, stems and wild earth. She isn’t afraid to take up space, nor is she afraid to ask for more. More beauty. More bramble. More texture. More color. And nothing shy of the full spectrum. Red poppies speckle sunny meadows. Orange tiger lilies brighten the foreground. Yellow swallowtail flit hither and yon. Green — as in every sumptuous shade of it — shoots and sweeps across the landscape. Blue chicory dances along roadsides. Indigo buntings flicker among the woodland fringe. Violet hydrangeas sweeten the lawn. “More is more is more,” she says, weaving among peach and coral roses; the first stunning wave of starshaped clematis; a swell of multicolor zinnia. The air is an amalgam of honeysuckle, lemon balm, basil and gardenia. More fragrance? If it’s good enough for the hummingbirds, bring it on: Rivers of feathery bee balm, cascades of trumpet creeper, explosions of flowering salvia. Bring on the music-makers, too. The buzzers and screamers. All who twitter, chirp and croon. Listen for the rattle call of the northern flicker. The coo of the pigeon. The lusty moan of the lonely bullfrog. In the garden, the squash plants runneth over. Green tomatoes fatten on the vine. Salad greens reach for the rising sun. Bring on your glorious wildness, June. Your luscious toomuchness. Your sultry, voluptuous summer. No need to hold back.
The Art & Soul of Greensboro
June is bustin’ out all over. — Oscar Hammerstein II
All That Glitters According to Smithsonian Magazine, two of this year’s most “dazzling celestial events” happen this month, beginning with the first supermoon of the year on Tuesday, June 14. What, you ask, is a supermoon? It’s when the moon is full at its perigee (aka, closest proximity to Earth). According to NASA, a supermoon can appear up to 14 percent larger and 30 percent more luminous than a full moon at its apogee (farthest point from Earth). As if June needed one more reason for us to swoon. Next on the don’t-miss-it docket: five planets in rare alignment from June 19–27. Make that six if you’ve got a telescope and minimal light pollution. Just before sunrise, gaze toward the eastern sky for a chance to spot Mercury low on the horizon, then Venus (always the brightest planet), Mars, Jupiter (second brightest) and Saturn (high in the south) in a diagonal line visible to the naked eye. Those with proper optics may also spot Uranus — yep, that bright green speck — just above Venus. Do look up. At the very least, you might catch some fireflies.
The Color Purple(ish) It’s beet season. If their vibrant magenta color wasn’t reason enough to love them, consider that these earthy roots are loaded with antioxidants, fiber, folic acid and potassium. Even their greens are a superfood. And nothing says summer like a cold beetroot salad. Boil them until tender. Once cool, peel them under cold running water, then cut into 2-inch cubes. Toss them with olive oil, orange juice, cumin, salt, fresh mint and cilantro. Admire your stained fingers . . . and enjoy. OH
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84 O.Henry
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June 2022 Bonnie Raitt
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Scott Blackburn’s Novel
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Although a conscientious effort has been made to provide accurate and up-to-date information, all events are subject to change and errors can occur. Please call to verify times, costs, status and location before planning or attending an event.
food in Market Square. Free admission. LeBauer Park, 208 N. Davie St., Greensboro. Info: greensborodowntownparks. org/calendar.
WEEKLY HAPPENINGS WEDNESDAYS
RUNTHEBORO. 7 a.m. A field trip for runners (and walkers) to explore different areas of the city each week. Free. Info: runnerdudesruntheboro.com.
BOOKS IN THE GARDEN. 10–11 a.m. Ms. Shelli returns with a story and craft program for children 5 and under plus their parents. Free. Gateway Gardens, 2924 E. Gate City Blvd., Greensboro. Info: nc-greensboro.gov (click on “events”).
THURSDAYS CYCLING CLUB. 6–8:30 p.m. Cyclists meet weekly for an easy ride. Free. LeBauer Park, 208 N. Davie St., Greensboro. Info: greensborodowntownparks.org/calendar.
SATURDAYS
SUNSET CONCERT SERIES. 7–9 p.m. Bring a lawn chair or picnic blanket for a night of live entertainment. Free. LeBauer Park, 208 N. Davie St., Greensboro. Info: greensborodowntownparks.org/calendar.
JUNE EVENTS June 1–30
FRIDAYS
OSTENSIBLY SO. An exhibit offering new ways to look at three-dimensional objects. Free. Weatherspoon Art Museum, 500 Tate St., Greensboro. Info: weatherspoonart.org/calendar.
TUNES @ NOON. 11 a.m.–2 p.m. Enjoy live music and
BIG RUN 5K. 6 p.m. Celebrate
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June 1
9 global running day and support Matt’s Run to Fight Hunger with a 5K race through Country Park. Registration: $25. 3802 Jaycee Park Drive, Greensboro. Info: triviumracing.com/event. RESCUE FUNDRAISER. 6–8 p.m. A fundraising event for local animal rescue organization Tails of the Unwanted. Doggos Dog Park & Pub, 1214 Battleground Ave., Greensboro. Info: doggosparkandpub.com. READ THE WORLD. 7–8 p.m. Scuppernong Books hosts a virtual discussion of When We Cease to Understand the World by Benjamin Labatut. Free. Info: scuppernongbooks.com/event. CHRIS ROCK. 8 p.m. Comedian Chris Rock performs on his Ego Death World Tour. Steven Tanger Center, 300 N. Elm St., Greensboro. Tickets and Info: tangercenter.com/events.
June 2 BLOCK PARTY. 5–7 p.m. Say Yes Guilford hosts their First Generation Block Party. Free.
Pollinator Day
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LeBauer Park, 208 N. Davie St., Greensboro. Info: greensborodowntownparks.org/calendar.
June 3 KIDS NIGHT OUT. 6–9 p.m. Children ages 5–12 are invited to enjoy a Friday night full of games, crafts, dinner and a movie. Registration required; $20/child. Griffin Recreation Center, 5301 Hilltop Road, Greensboro. Info: nc-greensboro.gov (click on “events”).
June 3–30 WE ART GSO. The Center for Visual Artists presents We Art Greensboro, a community exhibition showcasing local artists through August 14. Free. Greensboro Cultural Center, 200 N. Davie St., Greensboro. Info: mycvagreensboro.org.
June 4 BK5K. 8:30 a.m. This road race in honor of Bob Kierlin,founder of Fastenal and lifelong supporter of youth programs, will be awarding cash prizes to its top finishers. Registration: $10/youth; $20/ The Art & Soul of Greensboro
Calendar adults. 4100 Beechwood Drive, Greensboro. Info: bk5k.com. TRAILS DAY. 9 a.m.–Noon. Experienced and novice hikers, mountain bikers and paddlers are invited to explore the joys of hiking and enjoy trail-related events. Free. Country Park, 3905 Nathanael Greene Drive, Greensboro. Info: nc-greensboro.gov (click on “events”). FAMILY HIKE SERIES. 10 a.m.–Noon. Enjoy a leisurely hike as a family while learning about local flora, fauna and folklore. Free. Copperhead Trail, 3110 Forest Lawn Drive, Greensboro. Info: nc-greensboro.gov (click on “events”). KIDS’ KLUB. 11 a.m. Join Nathan Ryan & the Whomevers on the first Saturday of the month for music, arts & crafts, games and more. Free.
LeBauer Park, 208 N. Davie St., Greensboro. Info: greensborodowntownparks.org/calendar.
activities. Free admission. Tanger Bicentennial Garden. Info: greensborobeautiful.org/event.
ART IN THE PARK. 1–5 p.m. Celebrate creativity and the arts with fun, food and live entertainment. Free admission. LeBauer Park, 208 N. Davie St., Greensboro. Info: intunegso.com.
COMMUNITY PICNIC. 5–7 p.m. Enjoy a box dinner from Chez Genèse or the Historic Magnolia House ($25/each, drink not provided) or BYO picnic. $10/person; children 10 and under free. Downtown Greenway at the corner of MLK Jr. Drive and Bragg Street, Greensboro. Info: downtowngreenway.org/events.
POETRY WORKSHOP. 4–5:30 p.m. Benjamin Bards lead a virtual discussion-based workshop for poets of all ages and skill levels. Free; registration required. Info: nc-greensboro.gov (click on “events”).
June 5 PARISIAN PROMENADE. Noon–5 p.m. Artistes and vendeurs line the sidewalk for Greensboro Beautiful’s annual tribute to all things French, including live music, art, games and
June 4–5 HARRY POTTER IN CONCERT. 7 p.m. (6/4) & 3 p.m. (6/5). GSO presents Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone with music from John Williams’ film score. Tickets: $35+. Steven Tanger Center, 300 N. Elm St., Greensboro. Info: tangercenter.com/events.
June 6 LAKE HIGGINS CLEANUP. 6–8 p.m. Join the Parks and Recreation and Water Resources departments for a lake cleanup to celebrate Guilford Creek Week. Free; registration required. Lake Higgins, 4235 Hamburg Mill Road, Greensboro. Info: nc-greensboro. gov (click on “events”).
June 7 YOGA IN THE GARDEN. 6:30–7:30 p.m. The YMCA of Greensboro continues its 6-week yoga program for all skill levels. Free; mats not provided. Tanger Family Bicentennial Gardens, 1105 Hobbs Road, Greensboro. Info: greensboro-nc.gov (click on “events”). PERCEIVER OF SOUND. 7–8:30 p.m. Join the Sound
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88 O.Henry
The Art & Soul of Greensboro
Calendar Research Studio for the sixth Perceiver of Sound session, a new and unique program for everyone who makes or listens to sounds. Free; donations accepted. Elsewhere Museum, 606 S. Elm St., Greensboro. Info: elsewheremuseum.org.
June 9 SCOTT BLACKBURN. 6–7 p.m. Join in a reading and discussion of It Dies With You, a novel by Scott Blackburn. Free. Scuppernong Books, 304 S. Elm St., Greensboro. Info: scuppernongbooks.com/event.
ART AT WINDSOR. 11 a.m.– Noon. Youth participants will paint, listen to music and enjoy snacks. Registration required; $5. Windsor Recreation Center, 1601 E. Gate City Blvd., Greensboro. Info: greensboronc.gov (click on “events”).
June 7 & 14
JJ GREY & MOFRO. 8 p.m. JJ Grey and band Mofro perform live; The 502s open. Tickets: $29.95+. Carolina Theatre, 310 S. Greene St., Greensboro. Info: carolinatheatre.com/events.
DUNLEATH PORCHFEST. Noon—5 p.m. Porches in the Dunleath Historic District turn into performance venues for the afternoon. Free. Info: dunleath.org/events.
June 11
GAMGA CON. Noon–4 p.m. An anime, manga and graphic novel convention to promote literacy for teens and young adults. Free. Central Library, 219 N. Church St., Greensboro. Info: greensboro-nc.gov (click on “events”).
H2O ARTMAKING. 1–2 p.m. Green Hill Center for NC Art invites families to enjoy waterinspired art activities. Free. LaBauer Park, Greensboro. Info: greenhillnc.org/h2o.
June 8 BONNIE RAITT. Enjoy an evening with Bonnie Raitt, the singer, songwriter and guitarist best known for a unique style that blends blues, R&B, rock and pop. Tickets: $55+. Steven Tanger Center, 300 N. Elm St., Greensboro. Info: tangercenter.com/events.
ENGLISH DANCE. 10 a.m.–4 p.m. Learn and practice popular English country dances from the late 18th and 19th centuries as seen in Bridgerton and Pride and Prejudice. Free. High Point Museum Lecture Gallery, 1859 E. Lexington Ave., High Point. Info: highpointmuseum.org.
FOOD TRUCK RODEO. 4–9 p.m. Sample a variety of food truck vendors on Church
Downtown Greensboro
Avenue in downtown High Point. Free. Info: greensborofoodtruckfestivals.com. POETS ABATE. 2–3 p.m. Join poets Chris Abbate, Joan Barasovska and Caroline Cottom as they discuss and share their respective works. Free. Scuppernong Books, 304 S. Elm St., Greensboro. Info: scuppernongbooks.com/event. SPEAKEASY 5K. 8:30 p.m. Race through downtown GSO at night, then enjoy postrace cocktails. Greensboro Distillery, 115 W. Lewis St., Greensboro. Registration: $30+; $15/spectators. Info: triviumracing.com/event.
June 11–30 BESTIARY. From June through December, visit the exhibit Bestiary: Animals as Symbols and Metaphors, a menagerie of two and three-
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shops • service • food • farms dimensional representations of familiar animals. Free. Weatherspoon Art Museum, 500 Tate St., Greensboro. Info: weatherspoonart.org/calendar.
June 13–16 TEEN ART WORKSHOP. 4:15–6:15 p.m. Children ages 12–17 are invited to participate in “Focus on the Wheel,” a pottery workshop. Registration: $115/session. Greensboro Cultural Center, 220 N. Davie St., Greensboro. Info: artsgreensboro.org/event
June 13–19 BACKLASH TO FREEDOM. 11 a.m.–4 p.m. Celebrate Juneteenth with self-guided exhibits and a different shoebox lunch n’ learn daily. Cost: $17.99+. The Historic Magnolia House, 442 Gorrell St., Greensboro. Info: thehistoricmagnoliahouse.org.
June 16–19 JUNETEENTH GSO. The Gate City celebrates Juneteenth, an annual holiday commemorating the end of slavery in the United States, with a three-day festival packed with events. Full schedule and info: juneteenthgso.com or see Short Stories, p. 12.
June 17–19 & 24–26 SHREK THE MUSICAL. CTG presents Shrek The Musical, the tale of an unlikely hero who finds himself on a life-changing journey alongside a wisecracking donkey and feisty princess. Tickets: $10+. Carolina Theatre, 310 S. Greene St., Greensboro. Info: carolinatheatre.com/event.
June 18 PANCAKES FOR UKRAINE. 8 a.m.–Noon. Enjoy a lemon-
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blueberry pancake breakfast; proceeds support hunger relief efforts in the Ukraine. GSO Farmers Curb Market, 501 Yanceyville St., Greensboro. Info: gsofarmerscurbmarket.com. RESIDENCY TALK. 3–5 p.m. Chat with the museum’s newest art residents and learn about their work, influences and future collections. Free. Elsewhere Museum, 606 S. Elm St., Greensboro. Info: elsewheremuseum.org. BACK TO BROADWAY. 7–9 p.m. Join Triad Pride Performing Arts for their Back to Broadway Choral Concert, an evening full of timeless show tunes. Tickets: $10 student/senior; $20. Virginia Somerville Sutton Theatre at Well-Spring Retirement Community, 4100 Well Spring Drive, Greensboro. Info: triadprideperformingarts.org.
CROWDER. 7:30 p.m. Crowder performs its “My People” Tour with special guests We The Kingdom, Anne Wilson and Patrick Mayberry. Tickets: $32.50+. Greensboro Coliseum Complex, 1921 W. Gate City Blvd., Greensboro. Info: greensborocoliseum.com/events.
June 22 FAMILY ART NIGHT. 5:30– 7:30 p.m. Families are invited to enjoy art projects appropriate for all ages. Free. Xperience @ Caldcleugh, 1700 Orchard St., Greensboro. Info: greensboronc.gov (click on “events”).
June 24 HANK WILLIAMS JR.. 8 p.m. The country music star performs for one night only. Tickets: $39.50+. Greensboro Coliseum Complex, 1921 W. Gate City Blvd., Greensboro. Info: greensborocoliseum.com/events.
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O.Henry 91
The Art & Soul of Greensboro
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The Art & Soul of Greensboro
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Calendar June 25 POLLINATOR DAY. 9 a.m.–noon. Master Gardener volunteers teach participants how to attract and protect pollinators. Free. Demonstration Garden, 3309 Burlington Road, Greensboro. Info: guilfordextension.com. BUBBLE PAINTING. 10 a.m.–2 p.m. Create a masterpiece using only bubbles and paint. Free. High Point Museum’s Little Red Schoolhouse, 1859 E. Lexington Ave., High Point. Info: highpointmuseum.org. VEGFEST. 11 a.m.–4 p.m. The Annual Triad VegFest brings plant-based vegan vendors to downtown GSO. Free admission. Center City Park, 200 N. Elm St., Greensboro. Info: triadvegfest.org. FAREWELL H2O. 5:30–8
p.m. Visit the gallery for a talk with H2O artist Kevin Palme where he discusses his largescale, site-specific floor drawing using salt crystals (5:30–7 p.m.), then stay for the exhibit’s closing reception (6–8 p.m.) with live music from Chapel Hill band Red Nucleus. GreenHill Center for NC Art, 200 N. Davie St., Greensboro. Info: greenhillnc.org. MISS NC FINALS. 7:30 p.m. See who will be crowned this year’s Miss North Carolina. High Point Theatre, 220 E. Commerce Ave., High Point. Tickets and Info: highpointtheatre.com/event.
June 25–26 PAW PATROL LIVE! Children and families are invited to PAW Patrol Live! The Great Pirate Adventure, an action-packed musical. Tickets: $15+. Steven
Tanger Center, 300 N. Elm St., Greensboro. Info: tangercenter.com/events.
Greensboro. Info: carolinatheatre.com/event.
June 25–July 30
TIE DYE & CHILL. 4–6 p.m. In preparation for July 4, tiedye your own custom T-shirt, then take a dip in the pool. Registration required; $10/ person. Lindley Pool, 2914 Springwood Drive, Greensboro. Info: greensboro-nc.gov (click on “events”). OH
EMF. The 61st Eastern Music Festival kicks off a month of performances. Full schedule and info: easternmusicfestival.org.
June 26 CURIOSITIES. 11 a.m.–3 p.m. Better than a yard sale, Curiosities at the Curb is a bazaar of vintage items, antiques and crafts. Free admission; early bird tickets (11 a.m.– Noon): $2. GSO Farmers Curb Market, 501 Yanceyville St., Greensboro. Info: gsofarmerscurbmarket.com.
June 28
June 30
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CAROLINA CLASSIC. 7 p.m. Enjoy this month’s classic film, Stir Crazy. Tickets: $7. Carolina Theatre, 310 S. Greene St.,
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94 O.Henry
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O.Henry Ending
A Shot of the Dark A Brief History of an Espresso Obsessive
By David Claude Bailey
Potpourri gift shop that I purchased the shining brass apparatus that turned my yen for European espresso into an obsession. It was a flip-drip, Neapolitan coffee maker that I fueled with Medalgia D’Oro, which always smells ever so slightly — and invitingly — of burnt anchovies.
A gruff Frenchman pulled my first cup of espresso in a bar in Cherbourg, where the rising sun fell on dock workers throwing back shots of espresso and something vile in tiny, little glasses. Hitchhiking across Europe at 16, the intensity of Europe’s café experience and the potent black jets of java rocked my world. But my mother had prepared me for espresso in my hometown of Reidsville by keeping a percolator on our stove reheating and re-perking coffee. As the day progressed, a dark slurry coalesced so potent it triggered endorphins before I knew I had them. Since then, I’ve led a coffee-centric life, preparing gallons of the stuff in a succession espresso machines and pots, one of which I backpacked into the Grand Canyon. I remember in the ’60s and ’70s when espresso in fancy American restaurants was accompanied by a lemon peel and cube of sugar that you dipped into your brew. I had espresso in Greenwich Village and Pike Place Market before Starbucks existed. I spent a week in Trieste at Illy’s Università del Caffè learning barista skills for an article for Delta’s in-flight magazine, Sky. Later, Dennis Quaintance kindly did not fire me after an enthusiastic coffee consultant and I recalibrated the machines at Green Valley Grill, triggering a fire storm of complaints from regulars whose coffee was suddenly kicked up several notches. I’ve had inexpressibly bad espressos traveling in Peru, Malaysia, Greece, and, yes, even in Italy, France and Spain, from self-serve machines in gas stations.
96 O.Henry
But the oddest cup of espresso I’ve ever had was in Reidsville. A few years ago, I’d discovered that McDonald’s has decent espresso for $1.38 if you can coach the cashier to find it on the computer screen. For the longest time, the manager had to be called over to make it, but nowadays, most of the burger flippers are sufficiently cross-trained to realize all you have to do is hit the right button. So one day on the way home from taking my sister hiking at Hanging Rock I informed her I was stopping at the Lucky City’s McDonald’s to have an espresso. “This is Reidsville,” she said. “They won’t know how to make it.” I countered, “If they serve coffee, which they do, they’ll have it.” She gave me that look that said, “you’ve always been bull-headed.” I was able to help the cashier put in the order and got my endorphin receptors ready — as I waited and waited and waited. I noticed a gaggle of employees around the coffee machine. Finally, the manager came over to say that they were working on my order. After an eternity, a chagrined clerk came forward with my espresso. “Something’s wrong with our machine,” he said. “It took forever to get your cup full, but here it is.” It was luke-warm and instead of an ounce and a half of java, the cup brimmed with at least ten espresso shots pulled one after another. You can go home again, but you might not get a decent cup of espresso. OH Contributing Editor David Claude Bailey concedes that you can get an excellent cup of espresso in downtown Reidsville at Sip Coffee House. The Art & Soul of Greensboro
ILLUSTRATION BY HARRY BLAIR
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