Sometimes I like to watch old sitcoms (my husband is partial to Seinfeld while I’m nostalgic about Full House and Home Improvement). I like the feeling of stepping back in time, of remembering simpler seasons of my life. Have you ever noticed while watching these shows how present the characters are in the moment? Have you observed the difference in their posture? No one is ever looking down at their phone. Compare that to a modern-day scene in a subway station, a doctor’s office waiting room, or a grocery store check-out line.
We spend so much of our lives these days looking down…and looking inward. Because our work, our newsfeeds, and our social connections are often managed through digital platforms, our phones have become the window through which we engage with the world. Plenty of ink has been spilled over how this is affecting society, but truthfully, I don’t believe we’ve even begun to scratch the surface of the anthropological impact of this shift in engagement. It is physiological, emotional, social, intellectual, and spiritual.
Moreover, in an increasingly individualistic culture, we spend more time isolated, alone with our thoughts, cloistered in our air-conditioned homes, working remotely, shopping online, driving alone in our cars, interacting behind the safe wall of the social media “block” button. Housing, transportation, commerce, vocation - everything is designed to facilitate seclusion. We interact more with artificial intelligence than with actual human beings.
Even in homes filled with family members, we often retreat to the isolation of our phones, spending our time scrolling through news feeds and video content, spatially proximate, but mentally and emotionally distant.
The stories told to us by these feeds are often grim ones. Social media algorithms are inclined towards the extreme…the inflated. They are prone to proliferate an exaggerated version of reality. It is the angriest, most extreme voices that are platformed. Moderation is never rewarded by the algorithm, and therefore, our understanding of the outside world is often skewed. A soulless, mathematical sequence and capital driven computation is dictating to us what is normal. We live in a fog of false narratives.
I learned this the hard way in the aftermath of Hurricane Helene and the catastrophic flooding it brought to Western North Carolina.
Conditions on the ground were dire indeed, with whole communities cut off, roads washed away, and thousands of bridges and structures damaged. But if you were to base your understanding of the flood response on social media, you would think that we were all alone up here in the mountains and that the government had totally ignored us. You would think that FEMA was coming to steal land, mine lithium, and kick people out of temporary shelters.
And you would also think that the mountains were teeming with newly formed armed militia groups, aiming their rifles at any outsiders - governmental officials and civilian Samaritans alike.
These stories, of course, were propagated by social media influencers with nefarious motives…chasing likes and shares, eager to make the algorithm of hyperbole work in their favor. Eager to gain followers and earning potential, they skewed the narrative, highlighting all federal failures and suppressing any stories of success. Images of aggressive “hillbillies” tapped into darker, decades old stereotypes circulated by media companies and extractive industries eager to exploit Appalachians by transforming the outside world’s understanding of us. (but that is for another newsletter!)
The point I am making is that our phones and the media tried to tell us what was happening in our own hollers and across our own hillsides. And while the government response has not been perfect (is it ever!?), the recovery efforts by and large have been very heartening. The speed at which our infrastructure (main roads, power grids, and water systems) has been rebuilt is astounding. Supplies and donations from all over the world came pouring in as fast as those flood waters. And most notably, the neighbor to neighbor, kinship support system was a site to behold - so beautiful, so inspiring.
When I actually LOOKED UP from my phone and allowed my own eyes to tell me the story of the flood recovery, I was incredibly encouraged. (An anecdote, last month, two FEMA workers knocked on my door to ask if I had any storm damage and if I knew how to apply for assistance. They were really nice. I asked if they’d been harassed by any locals, and they smiled and said, “no everyone’s been really nice!”)
I actually think we are all a lot nicer than our phones lead us to believe!
The same is true of my experience of the election. On November 6th, my social media feed was filled with stories of elation and apocalypse. According to the news and posts, the nation was wounded and divided beyond repair. Civil War was nigh, and the end was near.
But that was decidedly not the story when I actually LOOKED UP. I saw the nation going about its business. Here in Western North Carolina, I saw folks wearing MAGA hats helping neighbors with Harris signs in their yards. Many people I talked with felt conflicted in the voting booth, and few saw either candidate as the solution to all our problems.
I know the impacts of the election will be felt by some more than others - not everyone is kind, rage is sometimes warranted, and the work of justice trudges onward. But what is statistically true is that most Americans are far more politically moderate than social media and the 24-hour news cycle (and frankly our entire political ecosystem) would lead us to believe. This would be clear to us…if only we LOOKED UP.
I used to work in an office, and what I loved about it was that it forced me every day to interact with people who had difference political, social, and religious beliefs that me. There, I learned that the “enemy” that lives in the mind is usually more malevolent and vicious than the real, flesh and blood “enemy.” When face to face, we learn that our adversaries are often kinder than we thought, more nuanced, more complex.
Actually, more like me than I ever imagined.
I can state without hesitation (and this might not be true for everyone), that I was happier working in an office than working from home. My body, my mind, my heart just felt better. Because an office job forced me to LOOK UP.
Looking up requires us to pay attention to the particulars. I’m reminded of that Wendell Berry quote where he notes, “No matter how much one may love the world as a whole, one can live fully in it only by living responsibly in some small part of it. Where we live and who we live there with define the terms of our relationship to the world and to humanity.”
The world as a whole can often feel daunting, overwhelming, too much, too bad, too lost. But the world in particular to me - MY family, MY neighborhood, MY community is filled with so much hope. Possibility. It is absolutely manageable, absolutely able to be held.
And so, my goal for the New Year is to LOOK UP. Escape the distorted and dramatized and focus on what my own eyes tell me is real.
If national politics feels morally bankrupt and adverse to the flourishing of your community, LOOK UP. Participate in local politics. Go to town council meetings, run for office, talk to your public servants about your needs and desires.
When the church universal seems too rife with abuse, bleeding congregants, beyond saving, LOOK UP. See what’s going on in your local church, the ways they are serving their neighbors and loving one another.
When wars and conflicts on the other side of the world encroach upon the edges of your own heart and mind, LOOK UP. Find ways to practice peace in your own community through volunteering, financial giving, and raising awareness
LOOK UP - at the glory of the skies, the wonder of art, the elderhood of the mountains, the consistency of the rivers, the tenacity of the trees, the beauty of every human face. I truly believe it will help clear some of the fog, will orient you to what is real and true.
Lots of people denigrate New Year’s resolutions, saying the calendar is simply arbitrary and that the cultural pressure to make lofty goals only sets us up for failure. But I kind of like the way the calendar creates an internal compulsion to take inventory of your life. It is a ritualized evaluation of what you want to pick up and what you want to leave behind.
In Appalachian folklore, there is a belief that what you do on New Year's Day is how you will spend the rest of your year. It may be a silly superstition, but I believe there is some truth to it. And so, I plan to spend to spend the day looking up: at my family, at the landscape, at friends and neighbors. I believe this will give me a truer story of what the world is like.
AND NOW FOR SOME PROVISIONS…
The song Look Up by Joy Oladokun has been rolling around in my head…for obvious reasons. I highly recommend you listen to this song if LOOKING UP is something you’ve resolved to do in the new year.
Look up, do you see the sunlight?
Look up, there's flowers in your hair
Hold on, 'cause somebody loves you
You know trouble's always gonna be there
Don't let it bring you to your knees”
Another Southern/Appalachian tradition is to eat greens and black-eyed peas on New Years Day. There are lots of explanations for this strange ritual: some say that if you eat “like a pauper” on New Years Day, you’ll eat like a king the rest of the year. Others say that the leafy greens represent paper money and the promise of prosperity for the new year. Black-eyed peas came to America with enslaved Africans during the trans-Atlantic slave trade. Enslaved gardeners would cultivate their own small patches of black-eyed peas, and that provision served as a supplement to their meager food supplies, especially during winter. For one (or for all) of these reasons, these foods came to be associated with New Year’s Day. I like to make mine in soup form!
Start by browning pork sausage in a large pot. Remove and then brown a chopped onion and garlic in the grease. Toss in some diced red bell peppers, sliced carrots, and sliced celery. After 4 or 5 minutes, pour in a bunch of water…maybe 6 or 7 cups. Put a ham hock in the pot. Bring to a boil and toss in some collard greens (or kale if you find yourself like me…UP IN WISCONSIN FOR THE NEW YEAR WITH NARY A COLLARD GREEN IN SITE!!). Simmer for an hour or hour and a half. Finally, dump in two cans of black-eyed peas and the sausage. Salt generously.
Finally, one more Appalachian Tradition…
“Old Christmas” is still celebrated on January 5th and 6th in some parts of rural Appalachia. In the late 1500s, Pope Gregory XIII proposed a new calendar to account for the fact that the year was actually 365.25 days long. For many across the world, the calendar jumped ahead 11 days, but many Scots Irish (staunchly anti-Catholic) held on to the old calendar. When the Scots-Irish immigrated to Appalachia in droves, they held on to this custom, which meant they celebrated Christmas on January 5th and 6th (which happens to be the end of traditional Christmastide or Epiphany).
Tradition says that pokeberry and apple blossoms bloom on Old Christmas Eve, and that if you go to the barn at Midnight, you’ll see the animals kneeling to the Christ child. They may even talk to you!
It’s a day that recognizes the upside-down nature of Christ’s kingdom, the upending of norms and wisdom that is found even in humble places. I like to spend Old Christmas giving a few more small gifts to my family and taking time to be in nature, to see where Christ might show his presence in the frozen landscape and simple praise of the birds and animals.
Happy New Year and Merry Old Christmas to all!
I am so glad I read this today. Thank you, Amanda.
Beautiful and true. This will now be one of my New Year's goals, too!