I usually flip on the news first thing, while the espresso is building up steam and my eyes are barely open.
In my case, it’s likely CBS, but that’s random chance – it could be any national broadcast: ABC, CNN, FOX, NBC. Much of the last news cycle would have led with hurricanes, one of which hit at least a glancing blow here (Helene), and the other a direct hit on central Florida (Milton).
But they can’t cover it. In a catastrophe, all real news is local.
Helene hit the coast in Florida, missed Tallahassee, and went straight through Georgia, nearly destroying western North Carolina and parts of southern Virginia. I taught for a year at Sewanee, so I’m familiar with the layout: isolated, tightknit mountain communities of families on the same spot of ground for generations.
“The mountains aren’t that high,” they say, “it’s just that the valleys are so low.” A fun saying, but also pretty accurate. When a flood comes, it rushes almost unimpeded through washes, dry riverbeds and into the “hollows,” spreading out in a thick, muddy hellbroth, moving fast, wiping out whole villages upland, and drowning the rocky lowlands.