Fall days bring nostalgic memories. But let’s be realistic about the present, too.
It was a week to feel nostalgic. In good ways. In sad ways. In wistful ways.
Perhaps the North Carolina State Fair is a deep-fried metaphor of how we connect with the past and wonder about the future.
One of my favorite News & Observer combos — writer Martha Quillin and photographer Travis Long — were at the State Fair last week to reflect on the end of restaurant row, the busy corridor at the fair where you’re likely to see your neighbor’s cousin’s best friend serve pie and other goodies. Because everyone wants to support church groups and community-service organizations such as the Apex Lions Club.
Restaurant row will be no more after the fair ends this year, replaced by a nebulous new building that the message handlers are cheerily calling an events center.
Let Martha explain in Martha’s way why restaurant row’s evolution means the pie is going away for an events thing: The structure, which may actually be more than one structure joined together, is thought to have been built in the 1960s or before to house the kitchens and dining areas of what were the earliest food vendors at the fair: churches, civic groups and small family-owned operations. The building, which replaced earlier structures that served the same purpose beginning in the 1930s, is basically a long, enclosed shed partitioned into seven spaces.
Basically, we are wistful for the death of a shed and the birth of additional indoor plumbing in this millennium.
We get it.
Taylor and Shania
To quote this century’s philosopher of culture and NFL gameday couture:
Bye, bye, to everything I thought was on my side
Bye, bye, baby
I want you bad but it’s come down to nothing
And all I have is your sympathy
(Editor’s note on the lyrics above: By paying homage to Taylor Swift and her song Bye Bye Baby (Taylor’s Version), I gain instant credibility — or a rep as a sycophant — with the new generation of The N&O staff. And likely passive contempt from Visuals Editor Scott Sharpe who knows I’m more of a Shania Twain fan. I only missed her recent concert in Raleigh because everything is past my bedtime.)
It’s understandable to roam the attic of our memories, huff away the dust, and insist we can’t improve on moments from yesteryear.
But is that the reality?
I hear often from retired journalists grousing about what’s gone missing. No doubt, and I’m clear-eyed about the present and future, the local news landscape has changed with deeper valleys and more rocky buttes. And, sadly, fewer journalists.
Impressive journalism of today
I’m impressed and inspired, though, by this generation of journalists who deliver storytelling skills and an adaptability acumen that understands your “newspaper” experience might be an app buried among other apps on that computer we call a phone. That breaking news no longer is defined by whether it’s above the fold. That breaking news gets delivered closer to real time than back in the day.
It’s not just journalism. Nostalgia comes with many reality checks across the state:
Politics: You can’t talk about redistricting without thinking of a quippy rhyme for gerrymandering. (For you cheeky wordsmiths, start with pandering, philandering and abandoning.) The current Republican majority means the Democrat-leaning Triangle will be reshaped into a half-eaten bagel. The reality check: Redistricting inequities also exist in Democrat-laden states. Politics always has operated like our childhood playground: The kid with the most marbles wins.
Culture: The N&O’s Drew Jackson wrote a stellar article on Lexington as the epicenter of North Carolina’s barbecue bubble. Feel this sentence from Drew on the Lexington experience: Here the fat drips steadily, sizzling into puffs of smoke. If you hold your breath and listen closely you can hear that hiss and hum behind the heavy metal doors. The reality check: For those who worry about aging pitmasters, NC barbecue historically has been about adaptation. The sizzle and smoke haven’t really changed.
Identity: Adam Wagner’s story on how the National Park Service purchased Outer Banks homes to tear them down is poignant because of the retirees who bought their Rodanthe beach house in 2021 — despite knowing of the imminent threat of rising ocean levels. Reality check: Sometimes fond childhood memories get swept away.
Nothing is truly perfect. So it’s OK to be nostalgic about the past and practical about the now.
Because isn’t a slice of homemade pie from the State Fair just another way to describe an event center for your tummy?
Bill Church is executive editor of The News & Observer. He gets most of his news from his iPhone but still finds it relaxing to read print newspapers on Sunday.
