Floyd County Scenes

We all need beauty in our lives...

Thanks to Andrea Marshall, Floyd County artist, jeweler, and musician, we have the gift of these fantastic Christmas ornaments made from dried okra and a little bit of fairy dust.

It is truly amazing how artists create beauty from humble elements.

 

Andrea's ornaments and jewelry can be found at Art Under the Sun on So Locust Street in downtown Floyd Virginia. She will often be heard performing during the Friday night gallery openings for the rest of the month.

Country living - what is your comfort level?

How many times have you thought to yourself, “I’ve had it with urban life. I want the quiet and charm of the country.” Perhaps you have spent weekends exploring those distant and picturesque little towns that lie off the beaten path just a few hours drive from almost every city in the US.

You may be one of the fortunate few who has found a town that seems to offer what you desire, or you may still be looking after years of searching. Either way, I'd like to suggest that you ask yourself a few questions which relate directly to your comfort level on things you will find in the country.

Country living offers a gradient scale of comfort with a corresponding gradient scale of price. At the lower end of the price spectrum, there is the fixer-upper dwelling with minimum amenities on the outskirts of a town that has a store and a filling station. The upper end of the country living spectrum includes gated mountain-top communities with shopping, spas, and all of the accouterments of high-end suburban life.

At the bottom end of the spectrum, you are literally up to your ankles in the countryside much of the year. At the upper end, you are safely insulated from the countryside and its inhabitants and your big-city guests will feel right at home.

Since there is a vast middle range of lifestyles available in the country, each with its particular level of comfort and intellectual stimulation, I propose that we out here in the country might organize a set of questions which we can pass out to visitors carrying real estate brochures.

The first set of questions were proposed by Doug Thompson and tested on a young couple thinking of finding a home in Floyd.  Read his account of the conversation and the comments too as both illuminate the difference between suburban and country life.

I think there are other questions that might help guide a visitor in choosing whether to live in Floyd, VA:

1. Are you planning to commute?
We have mountain roads that are icy in winter and clogged with traffic in the summer.
2. Do you have your own business?
Floyd has very few employers. Unless you are self-supporting, you have few alternatives to minimum wage jobs. If you are self-sufficient or an artisan/crafter, you will find Floyd to be a stimulating place to live.
3. Do you have at least one vehicle that has four wheel drive?
If not, plan on spending much of the winter unable to get in or out of your driveway.
4. Are you comfortable driving 40 miles to do most of your major shopping?
We have a supermarket and hardware stores in town, but it is a 40 mile round trip to the nearest city.
5. Are you a private person who enjoys living a quietly anonymous life?
In Floyd everyone will know more about you in the first week than your neighbors back home ever knew. It is far easier to remain anonymous in a city or a typical suburb than in a community like Floyd.
6. Are you handy with a chainsaw?
If not, better consider propane for heating.
7. What are the amenities that you count on every week to provided a satisfactory quality of life?
This can be a make/break discovery because few country town have an espresso bar, wi-fi, or a New York style deli. Your Jaguar or your Hummer will be many miles from the nearest mechanic and there is no source of freshly baked croissants for a hundred miles.

Happiness is all about having your expectations met. If you come to the country with expectations that match the amenities provided, you will be happy. If your expectations are not met, you will be wasting your time and money moving. Life is too short to waste time in the wrong places.

Make a list of the amenities that define your lifestyle and use them as a checklist when you find a country town that you like. It may save you a lot of time and money!

Good hunting!

Early impressions of life in Floyd

I am a new settler in a place that poets, farmers,
and hard-working business people have helped create.

It is a community of many contrasts, many lifestyles,
yet there is a sense of community.

It feels more like home than anywhere else I have ever lived.

There are people here who live in houses
without electricity or inside plumbing.
If you like 19th century living we have it here.

If you want to live on a mountaintop
and reach out to the world with electric fingers,
we have that here also.

We are a county with one stoplight
and more creative genius than you could imagine.
This is Floyd, VA, a place which embraces
both outdoor plumbing and fibre optic infrastructure.

I live here now, far from the beaches of Los Angeles
and far from the frenzy of Silicon Valley.
The palm trees and traffic of South Florida
are but a dim memory now,
as are the people-hives in the ever-growing
megalopolis of Washington-NY-Boston.

I came here to build a new life in a post-corporate world,
to write books and build woodwork of my own design.
I want to put down roots into this community
and turn my swords of corporate life into plowshares
with which to turn up opportunities
for myself and others.

This is fertile soil for new ideas,
but it is no land of milk and honey.
If you want work, you had best bring it with you.
Wresting a living out of this rocky soil
is a challenge for farmer and craftsman alike.
Only a talented and industrious few
have created businesses that employ many others.

One of the best things going for Floyd
is the plug and play aspect of its culture.
If you settle here, you will probably fit right in somewhere.

You will see hand-tooled boots and bare feet
passing each other on the main drag,
and rusted pickups with doors wired shut
parked next to armored Mercedes SUVs.

There is still room enough for all of us
and there is still a sense of caring for others
that has been lost elsewhere.
I can sit and have morning coffee
ensconced between people buying mountaintop McMansions
and a group of disabled people on an outing from their care center.

In Floyd, we all seem to be welcome somewhere.

Here, people work hard, but they make time for play.
When I see children clogging on the sidewalk
at the Friday Night jamboree,
it makes me more certain than ever
that I have come to the right place.
In this community, enjoying life
does not set me apart from others.

I am a blogger and I have so much fun
it is probably illegal somewhere.
Fortunately, the spirit of play
is a non-taxable intoxicant,
and I can drink as deeply as I want.

Citizen publishing (blogging) sets my ideas free
and the barriers are so low that the process is frictionless.
I write. Others read. They comment and tell others.
More people visit and the word spreads.

When you get tired of big city life and 24x7 traffic
and are ready to strike out on your own,
come to Floyd or some place like it,
this is your chance to pitch in and contribute
where your efforts will have some effect.

If you come equipped with talent
and a determination to make things go right,
you will fit right in.