I keep a piece of Mingo County on my desk. There have been many like it, but this one is mine.

Pieces of Mingo County, like this, have been taken away for more than 100 years. This piece is different, though. This piece reminds me of the cost paid by the men and women who mined this coal, who sacrificed in countless ways for their families and communities, and for the toll it’s taken on both the people and places of the Appalachian coalfields and elsewhere. I think about the hopes and dreams and fears and sorrow that hang like coal dust deep in the hollers of “Bloody Mingo.” I think about sacrifice and being sacrificed and I’m reminded of the difference between the two. I think about the natural resource and human extraction, blasted out, hauled away, never to return. And I think about what it is to return and how literally there are parts of Mingo County you can’t ever return to. I think about “Friends of Coal” and know that coal has never been a friend to Mingo County. I think about the wail of the train engines, the thunderous vibration of the tracks as coal cars roll out, taking another few hundred tons from the heart of the billion dollar coalfield, a heart that try as you may, you will never hollow out. Politicians have heralded it, outside interests have swallowed it, and we are all are complicit in our thirst for this nonrenewable resource. I think about my role in this, too. I think about home for me and it’s impossible to do so without thinking about coal.

This little piece of Mingo County keeps me thinking…