By: Cris Ramos, NC-based writer & mindful adventurer currently authoring a book on the profound lessons and screwups from my 20’s.
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The week I moved to Asheville, my fiancé’s aunt handed me a book called The Wildest Woman. Its cover is filled with the greenery that attracted both my partner and I to Western North Carolina, a natural forestry that holds the promise of connection and peace, a new life focused on creating something authentic and natural. But, was I ready to be lived a “mountain lifestyle” as so many of the Asheville publications claim the area is about?
At heart, I am a city girl. The product of two working-class parents who lived in the suburban area of Miami. It’s not the Miami people picture. In fact, several people I met from outside of South Florida looked at me with horrified eyes when I told them I grew up in Miami. They didn’t say as much, but I know they had images of grand theft auto and cocaine cowboys swirling around their minds as they pictured me, a small child, growing up in the midst of total lawlessness.
Now I live in East Asheville, a ten-minute drive from downtown on a road named after the creek that runs parallel to our two-story townhouse. The outside of it looks similar to the architecture of Key West, except we are surrounded by pine trees that stand well above the three-floor cottage-like units in our community.
Here, settled on the contemporary couches we lugged from Miami, I read a little bit of the book every morning. In my mind, I am in a modern cabin in the mountains. But Caroline, the novel’s muse, would call it “the confines of a city zoo.” Perhaps in comparison to the tropical suburbia of my childhood and high-rise condos that marked my twenties, a two-floor townhouse feels quaint. Apparently, it’s anything but and I am quickly learning this is actually a dwelling filled with creature comforts effectively separating me from the wilderness.
My city-ness shows up in moments like last week, when I considered it a personal feat that upon spotting a thick-bodied beige spider making its way towards my elbow, I opened the door and swatted it out... with my hand. Had I not been living in Asheville and forming a symbiotic relationship (read tolerable) to its many bugs, I would have shrieked in frozen panic. If I managed to hop out of the car and lose the spider, the vehicle would no longer be of use to me anymore. It would be the spider’s now.
Alas, I am not the only one. Fearing Asheville would be filled with mountain people, or my assumption of outdoorsy hikers with little appreciation for the indulgences of city folk, my mind was put at ease when I met my first friend. Well, to be fair, we’re not friends yet but we have exchanged numbers and on two occasions strongly expressed interest to hang out. My new future friend is an entrepreneur opening her own business with a beech-blonde pixie cut and a body filled with tattoos. One of the first things she told my fiancé and I at our community pool, which she frequents although doesn’t technically live here, was “We can have dinner or cocktails but I’m not into hiking.” I immediately recognized our burgeoning kinship.
My future-friend is an interesting fusion and a good representation of the young people here in Asheville. Her appearance is that of a city dweller, an alternative mixture seen in places like New York, but her Southern twang, unabashed realness and forward friendliness are the hallmark of Southern hospitality. She is an anomaly as most of the young people here seem to be.
According to in-depth conversation with another potential new friend, it’s to be expected. This friend’s appearance is closer to the casual hiker I expected, she wore a baseball cap, tee-shirt and jeans. She started conversation with my fiancé and I at a coffee shop/bar near our home. Another entrepreneur, she owns a concierge business in town (and several nearby markets), and had a few insightful observations to share on Asheville’s population.
“I always say, bring your person and your job,” she affectionately explained, “there is no job market here unless you’re in hospitality.”
She’s fiercely intelligent and also so very friendly, which still takes getting used to for me. Miami isn’t exactly a place to meet people randomly. Most relationships forged there are introductions to friends of friends or born out of a forced environment, like work or school. This whole, hi nice to meet you let’s be friends thing, does not happen often–– if at all. It’s refreshing and illuminating. I can sense my resistance to making the connection, a knee-jerk reaction from living in Miami where every new that you meet – outside of the situations described above – are likely angling to get something from you.
Yet here in the quaint bar, our new friend generously imparts the lay of the land. She shares as much as she asks who we are and what brings us here. She’s shocked to discover we both work remotely and happy to meet someone like her. Most of the young people moving here, and there is a wave, work 2-3 jobs in bars and restaurants to afford it. They’re here because they really want to be, but aside from food and drinks, there really aren’t any jobs for them.
Asheville folk have a name for the disparity between all the young, educated people who live here and the lack of industry to provide high enough paying jobs for them to afford buying a home: it’s called the Asheville Tax. Several locals I met at a recent Creative Mornings Talk revealed this is simply the price to pay for a peaceful life in the mountains.
When I came to Asheville and saw the colorful freedom-loving hippies in their new arts district and downtown, opening a slew of new businesses that appear to be pulled right out of instagram, I figured there must be opportunity. I would never have guessed it was still very much the haves and the have nots, as several older Asheville folk have described the populace.
“There are millionaires and then there are these struggling young people,” said a longtime resident and part-time yoga instructor. “It’s a tough market for these kids. Asheville ain’t cheap anymore.”
She says this with compassion in her voice and I can tell she wishes it were different. The mother of two college graduates herself, she recognizes her kids will probably move away. Asheville simply cannot provide a job with a skill set apart from tourism and hospitality.
I came here not to worry about the job pool, something that took most of my attention back in Miami. I couldn’t afford to be a writer finishing a book, taking projects here and there with people I wanted to work with, not had to. Here, we’re committed to a different life, a more authentic one, which isn’t to say we couldn’t be authentic in Miami... but something about the context did make it difficult.
Miami is a city for people with money – and for people who work their lives to make it. They are hustlers, in fact, if I had to describe Miami in a word it would be that, hustlers who aren’t afraid to get their hands (or reputations) dirty. There is a distinct shadiness in almost all business dealings and, in my experience, the absence of a moral compass. Although it sounds like we got outta Dodge fast, make no mistake, there is magic in Miami. As much as all these things are true, it’s also true that a younger generation is fighting to be the antithesis of all that – the tricky part is trying to change a game they still have to participate in. Therein lies the crux of the matter and why it’s hard to stay truly authentic. It’s tough not to get your hands dirty.
I don’t mind a little dirt. God knows Miami made me into someone “espavilada” or “with it.” I’m no stranger to someone trying to push their agenda, nor am I shy to effectively push back and negotiate boundaries. Miami is ripe with opportunity, as people flock to live there, the city is out of land and transforming each of its iconic neighborhoods into a burrow, much like New York. It wasn’t easy to leave Miami with all its potential as I’m writing a book based on my experiences living their in my twenties. Nor is it easy to acclimate to this strangely wonderful place with no job market for my skill set.
There is something spectacularly special about Asheville. I can feel it. The people are warm, open-minded and fiercely creative, they have to be to create a living here. The increasingly progressive population of young people who gather in coffee shops and breweries makes me want to be one of them, a local. You can’t put a price to walking out of the grocery store and seeing the mountains, or discovering like minded people at every place you go who remarkably want to meet you.
It’s still small enough to hold the charm of a tiny town and big enough to satisfy a craving for action and movement. There’s a reason it’s on every must move or visit list. It’s an undeniable power that comes from the mountains and the people cool enough to opt for the lifestyle they offer.
The Asheville tax is worth every penny so far.
