I've heard about things like this happening in other places all my life. Growing up in the upstate of South Carolina, I was familiar with the patterns and aftermath of hurricanes. I even lived through a few, although by the time they got to us, it was mostly rain and wind—never extreme flooding or devastation. That happened in other places... until it didn’t.
I was out of town when Hurricane Helene hit my hometown, which created a whole different type of trauma—an entirely different experience than what my family was having back in Western North Carolina. When we left for our Colorado vacation, there wasn't even a whisper about a hurricane coming. Just a few days into the vacation, we knew our home was in danger but could not have fathomed what was coming. I spent the next couple of days in touch with my family and friends, keeping track of what was happening and how bad it was expected to be (it was so much worse). Friday morning, panic hit. The eye of the storm was rolling over WNC after 24 hours of downpouring rain and winds. A friend messaged me to tell everyone I know to start filling up every bucket, their bathtub, everything they could find with water. She said the dam at the North Fork Reservoir was in danger of collapsing, which would take out the water system and drown the towns below—Swannanoa and Black Mountain. My business is in Black Mountain, and I have friends and loved ones in both places. Those calls and messages were bone-chilling. I've never felt so helpless in my life.
And then everything went black. No messages, no calls, no social media. I had zero contact with anyone back home. I had no idea what was happening. Our flight home was canceled with no reschedule date. We were stuck. And then pictures started showing up on my social media feed. Chimney Rock, one of my favorite day trip spots and home of one of my wholesale customers, was virtually gone. Water was up to the roofs in Swannanoa. The horror stories started coming in—whole neighborhoods gone, bodies in the river and in the trees. I still couldn't contact my family or friends.
So, we adjusted our plan. We rented a car and drove cross-country. When we left Colorado, there was still no way in or out of Western North Carolina. Every highway was washed out or closed, but we were determined to get home. People told us not to bother coming back—that it was a nightmare here. We had to. My partners' kids were here, my cats were here, and I had to know if my friends and family made it. We drove straight through for two days, and by the time we got close, one highway had reopened. We brought a generator, food, water, and gas cans with us. I was finally starting to hear from friends and family. Nothing could have prepared us for what we came home to.
There are four possible ways into my neighborhood. Three were completely washed out, the roads just gone. The last one was passable, but it was only half of a road, the other half being a drop-off. That was our only way in and out for at least a week. Our home was okay, but everything around us was destroyed. Five minutes down the road, houses were condemned. There were two cargo containers and a car upside down in the river (still are). A whole strip of local businesses was destroyed—washed away. And that was just my little town. Whole areas of Asheville are gone. Roads and bridges are gone. Entire neighborhoods destroyed. So many people are missing. Several of my wholesale customers lost everything. One of my wholesale customers' GMs, who was a sweetheart to deal with, was lost along with their entire family, washed away. Wrapping your mind around the mass loss and devastation isn't even possible. And it was—and still is—heartbreaking.
I was able to get back to the tea workshop that week and was relieved to see that the area was okay, although we had no power or water for almost two weeks. I started putting together a reframe. We were going into the holiday season... my first with Full Moon Tea Company. I needed my business to survive this. Yes, I still had a building and inventory, which is so much more than so many others had. But six weeks of holiday markets were canceled, wholesale customers lost everything, and the ones that survived couldn’t order. No tourists were here. I knew that if I didn’t reframe, my company wouldn’t make it past the fall. So, I reframed, accepted help from social media influencers, and used networking to get much-needed visibility. I leaned into local businesses that had survived and were putting together gift boxes to support local small businesses like mine. I worked harder in those few weeks than at any other point. I still had no internet or phone at the workshop, so I had to drive 15 minutes away to find a signal, screenshot online orders, and then go back and pack and handwrite shipping labels. I became close friends with my local post office workers. That church parking lot where I could get 5G became my office for about three weeks, while I constantly re-strategized to keep my business running. I haven’t for a second lost sight of how lucky I am that I even got to strategize and send orders out, instead of having to focus on rebuilding my business or my home. But survivor's guilt is real, and I still deal with it every day.
Life post-hurricane is sad every day. The trauma and grief don’t heal because you have to look at the destruction, think about the loss everywhere you go. The clean-up is taking so much longer than I thought it would... it will take years. My tea workshop, two months later, still doesn’t have potable water for handwashing or washing dishes, so we bring in giant containers of water so I can blend and pack tea. It’s exhausting, but again, it is a privilege that I am grateful for. The vast amount of help we have received is humbling, both for the area and for me as a small business owner. Every order matters to me, every kind word, every share on social media or with a friend. I knew early on that there was a bigger threat for WNC... that without tourism, even the businesses that survived the hurricane wouldn’t last through the winter. I am grateful to be part of a resilient community who continues to work together to clean up, rebuild, and constantly boost each other for continued support and growth. Asheville will rebuild, and it will be more magical than ever before, and my tea company, Full Moon Tea, will survive and grow, because it has to.
What a difficult situation, so much loss and wreckage. But you’re right, we just have to keep moving forward