Wonderbringers Newsletter with Monica Parker
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Hello wonderseekers!
This week, I have been devastated to see the pictures coming out of the Southern US in the aftermath of Hurricane Helene. I grew up in Florida and Louisiana, so I am no stranger to the havoc a hurricane can wreak, but to do damage all the way in the heart of Appalachia is unprecedented. For those unfamiliar with the terrain, it is a mountainous region 600 miles inland from where the hurricane first made landfall, 300 miles from the nearest coastline, and many thousands of feet in elevation. Many small towns in the mountains of Georgia, Tennessee, and the Carolinas contain entire extended families. The stories of some family members watching as others just vanished into the raging waters are beyond heart-wrenching, and it will be a very long time until they recover economically — even longer until they recover emotionally.
Obviously, there are terrible stories aplenty across the world, but this one hits different for me, as this area of the world was somewhere my father loved to take my brother and me as children. Places like Helen, Pigeon Forge and Asheville offered us respite from the steamy Atlanta summers, and in the autumn, they treated us to unmatched firework displays of russet, amber, and ochre leaves, peeped whilst roasting marshmallows by the fire.
I wrote a bit about Appalachia in my book, The Power of Wonder, and the memories are particularly poignant for me now:
When I was a child, I used to travel up to Appalachia to visit my best friend’s extended family. These were country mountain folk, whose environs and pastimes were leagues away from those of my suburban life in Atlanta. It was full of the exotic for me. The smell of woodsmoke and pickling spices combined with the earthy loam of farm life, sharing the air with cricket song and buzzing midges. We would pop morning glories, suck honeysuckle, and eat home-baked sheet cake topped with canned fruit cocktail. On Sundays, we went to church, where music and the occasional speaking in tongues were their connection to the holy. Doors stayed open, screens closed against the bugs, and you could catch glimpses of their quotidian through the mesh. Every grown-up was warm and welcoming and wrapped little girls like me in love as if we were their own. It was idyllic.
In the video this week are a few ways we can transform the horror of tragedy into the balm of wonder. (And you can find the Mr. Rogers quote here.)
Some wonderbringers for me this week:
Reconnecting with Wonder: When Were You Last Amazed?
Humanist manifesto: Finding Awe and Wonder in the One World We Have
Listen: On Being with Krista Tippett: John O’Donohue and The Inner Landscape of Beauty
I shared a really lovely conversation recently with Sam Hunter from her podcast Natural Born Thinkers. Have a listen.
And thank you for all the book recs! Please keep sending them, and in the next week or two, I’ll share some of them.
With wonder,
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