I was inspired to locate this “cave” in a retired mine, which I imagine to be like Portal 31 in in Lynch, Kentucky, where we’ve visited the area several times. Here I am outside Mine No. 31, and an image of an old mine (public domain), which is similar to what I had in mind. (Sara Jackson, former wonderful student, reminded me that she took the picture—thanks, Sara!—on a residency trip for our no-longer-in-existence master’s degree in Social Responsibility & Sustainable Communities.)

There’s the Benham Schoolhouse Inn there, the Kentucky Coal Museum with its Loretta Lynn floor, and nearby in Whitesburg, the wonderful Appalshop, which produces superb video documentaries on the area, for instance Sludge, Belinda, Stranger with a Camera, and Fast Food Women, all of which I’ve used in classes. Here’s their website.

Diana, the oldest of the three sisters in Letters from the Karst, is in eastern Kentucky as part of her work with Appalshop. Her contact, Edna, takes her son Tyler and Diana to the old mine, where a ceiling collapses behind them. But this is really Tyler’s story. Traumatized by his drug addicted father, he talks only in movie lines. He’s got a large repertoire and things he can say, in part to watching lots of movies and in part because he has a great memory.

The collapse occurs in the opening sentences. Then, Diana says,

“The danger’s over, don’t you think? Oh, shit. Ouch. Watch it, there’s something sticking up. Can you shine that over here?”

“It’s just a support beam. Look ahead, there’s a bunch of them. Can you see?”

“I see dead people,” Tyler said, watching as his mom played the light over a pile of what looked like bodies. They were stiff from almost a century lying there, and the miners had ignored them and eventually they got covered with old containers, empty lunch bags, dead batteries.

They continue their search for another way out, talking and sharing bits about themselves. The narrative alternates between the mine and Tyler’s memory of his father, an extremely abusive addict who betrays his son and shows no remorse. Tyler remembers how he’d talked back to his father:

Some dare-a-lick from Texas with big cowboy boots caught Tyler by the arm as he was walking past and pulled him between his legs. “I’ll give you $5,000 for this.”

“He’s worth twice that.”

In the truck Tyler had said, “You spent more’n that on this piece of shit, and it don’t even do your dirty work for you.”

Smack. “If that’s all the respect you got to show your father you can walk home and think about all I done for you.”

A few cars passed. After the first one slowed down, he started hiding in the weeds whenever he heard the whine of tires. He didn’t want to run into that Texan out here. Crouched there he watched a car full of partiers go off the road then get back on. A weak moon shed enough light to lay a ribbon through the trees where the road was. Coyotes on all sides yipped and howled. An owl cut a shadow across the sky. Crawling things rustled the leaves around him and from far away a dog’s bark became a yelp and then silence. He could live with the animals, he thought, someplace like where his dad’s strange uncle lived deep in the holler. Uncle Newby was crazy and everyone made fun of his hillbilly ways. Pipe. Piss can. Fishing pole. Green and blue bottles hanging from the trees. His mom used to say how living up there was just fine till someone broke a leg or got their foot caught in a trap.

So what. Accidents happen all the time, beginning with how you happen to get this mother and father. No one planned that. Not even God knew. So what if everyone went to church and said one thing and went home and did another. It wasn’t good or bad.

I enjoyed writing this though it wasn’t easy. I didn’t want to stereotype anyone, yet wanted to show how a caring mother and a wounded child negotiate through the very real problem of drug addiction. Tyler is a rather brilliant child, and his coping by speaking in movie lines seems unique and brave. Since Diana is there because she wants to help, I thought it important for Edna to challenge her on having a “rescue” mentality.

“So, how’d you end up on this project, here in eastern Kentucky?”

“It’s my last summer with Appalshop. I’ve been working with them for the last three years, doing interviews for films about the region. It’s what I want to do once I pass the bar—not interviews, but work in eastern Kentucky.”

“Why? You gonna come here and save the ignorant hillbillies?”

“I don’t see it that way.”

“We get alotta that, you know, do-gooders and liberals coming in here to basically do alotta looking and talking before they move on. But not before they take a bunch of pictures.”

“But I’m a Kentuckian, too, and I love the mountains. I love the people that I’ve met since I started working here. There’s no denying the problems. I’d think you all would welcome any help you can get.”

“Some help don’t end up helping.”

“As a lawyer, I think I could help.”

“What is it they say about lawyers—? Ninety-eight percent give the rest a bad name?”

Again, as I keep saying, I hope I’ve done them justice, Tyler and Edna, Diana, too.

You can order Letters from the Karst from your local bookstore, or through Amazon, here.