Rainelle was looking much better than when I last visited. With the railroad and lumber business booming, the eventual addition of the highway in the 1960s that cut across southern West Virginia had prevented visitors from coming through. The lumber business died down, as did the railroad, and what was left was a husk of a once thriving mountain town. Shop after shop on the main street sat empty. The old King Coal Hotel, with its signature giant piece of coal sitting outside, had burned down. The walls still stood, but once you stepped inside it was a hollow shell, with shower rods still poking out from the walls. It's just a rugged piece of land now, and the piece of coal is long gone.
It was mid afternoon, and the light was hitting the church is just the right way; the dark wood walls glistened and the front was blazoned with flowers and autumn decorations, which made chilly room seem much warmer. In the middle sat my grandfather's old military photo. The photo must have been taken sometime around the 1930s, once black and white but it was colored in, as were much of the photos of the time. He had his signature smirk, but it was such a young, handsome face that I never experienced first hand in real life, but you could see his personality never waned. A slide show was playing, recounting his 97 years of photos of him with his old Harley Davidsons, with his plane that he would fly through the mountains, with his four kids and multitude of grandchildren and great-grandchildren. It was a sullen affair, but my mom told me that though he's gone, the best parts of him are still with us.
We spent every summer driving to WV. As a child, the days in the car seemed long, but was surprised to hear that it only took less than 6 hours. My grandparent's home was nestled in between blue mountains. I remember their farm well; their RV that they had driven all over sat under a massive car port, and the barn sat in the middle of the land and we would go exploring in there. I haven't been to that house in years, and it's been a long time since I was in the state itself. As I drove back to Nashville, the highway twisted through the mountains. The fall light was perfect, never too bright and hit the changing leaves in such a beautiful way. I thought back on an old photo my dad sent me shortly after my granddad died; a sepia toned photo of him holding me. I couldn't have been more than a few weeks old, but his broad hands cradled me as a sat against his shoulder. The colors of the photo matched perfectly with the colors of the mountain. It's an odd sensation to feel so connected to a place that was never home.