Rocky Mount, NC: Sometimes I Have Doubts Too

I’ve written about believing in the future of Rocky Mount.

Some of you remember my story of seeing Peter Pan as a little girl at Chicago’s Schubert Theatre.

Tinker Bell’s light is fading. Peter Pan steps to the edge of the stage and asks the audience a simple question.

“If you believe in fairies, clap your hands.”

I remember clapping as hard as I could.

I have never forgotten that moment.

Perhaps that is why, years later, I find myself writing about believing in the future of Rocky Mount. Somewhere inside me, I still believe that people can make a difference, that communities can change, and that hope is never entirely misplaced.

But I will admit something. Only to those of you who keep me company on my Main Street Bench. Even I have moments when I doubt.

I watch elections decided by remarkably small numbers of voters and feel helpless. I watch or attend a City Council meeting that dissolves into conflict and bullying and down- right rudeness. It takes the energy right out of me. 

I look at Ward 1 and think, why don’t the downtown merchants work together and find a willing candidate to run and win that seat that is up for election in 2027. Believe me, the revitalization of downtown Rocky Mount would benefit, which is a win for everyone who has planted their flag downtown.

Afterward a Council meeting I read the comments.

“They should all resign.”

“Nothing ever changes.”

“Why bother voting?”

Those comments make me think of parliamentary democracies such as Great Britain. They have what is known as a vote of no confidence. When confidence in a government has disappeared, there is a constitutional way to acknowledge it.

America chose a different path.

Our officials serve fixed terms. Confidence is measured not by parliamentary votes, but by elections and the continuing engagement of citizens.

I think Rocky Mount is living through its own unofficial vote of no confidence. That old expression, ‘everyone is fit to be tied,’ sums it up.

Our no confidence is not recorded in the minutes, but is expressed in conversations every where you turn.

The deepest loss is not confidence in a council. It is confidence in the city itself.

One crisis after another has led to a loss of hope.

People stop voting. Good people decide not to run. Citizens quietly withdraw from the work of citizenship.

Alexis de Tocqueville understood this almost two hundred years ago when he observed,

“The health of a democratic society may be measured by the quality of functions performed by private citizens.”

Democracy has never depended solely upon those elected to office.

It has always depended upon citizens who refuse to give up on one another.

General George C. Marshall, one of my heroes, understood something similar after World War II. Europe lay in ruins. Institutions had failed. Confidence had vanished.

Marshall did not wait until people believed recovery was possible before beginning the work of rebuilding. We must figure out a way to rise out of these ashes.

I ask myself, what can I write that might encourage one more citizen to vote? One more qualified person to become a candidate? One more neighbor to believe that Rocky Mount is still worth the effort rather than moving away.

I’m not sure. But I do know that silence has never restored a city or, will it save our country.

I have started writing a series of historic house biographies. I have finished The Summerlin House on 430 South Church Street.

When I first saw the house driving by, years of deferred maintenance has taken its toll. I want you to take a look at it. You will see what has been lost.

But I want you to see as I do, what still remains. I am not ignoring the damage. but I refuse to believe the damage is the whole story.

I feel the same way about Rocky Mount. Before we can restore confidence, improve leadership, strengthen finances, or heal divisions, we have to see the painting on the wall differently. That’s what I try to do in writing the Mainstreetrockymount.com blog. I want you to look at things differently.

Time is precious as The Summerlin house proves. Time is of the essence in Rocky Mount right now. We need new emerging leadership. We need new eyes to step forward with a new perspective, a moral compass, and as I have written, that plays well with others.

The wonderful people who live here are the true architecture of the city worth saving.

When I get fretful about ‘things’, I remember a little girl in a Chicago theatre, clapping with all her might because someone had asked whether she believed.

Perhaps Rocky Mount is asking us that same question. I hope we all clap our hands because the future has always depended on those who still believe.