On a recent jaunt to North Carolina after a thoroughly enjoyable, but unintentionally scenic tour of the countryside, my friends and I stepped back in time across the porch of Mast General Store. I love that these nuggets of history are still around a bend on a country road in so many places here in the South. Locals, tourists, old and young, Nehi and Mountain Dew mingled in the aisles and lolled on the porches in the end-of-summer setting sun. These places, with their cobbled-together walls, wooden floors proudly wearing the tread millions of footsteps and their shelves piled high with generations of stories are a national treasure. I love to wander the aisles and rock on the porch, letting the perseverance of the place seep into my bones. May it take root there and last much longer than the weekend trip.
[slidepress gallery='mast-general-store,-nc']
