By Staff
Arthur McLean
There a scene in Monty Python's "The Holy Grail" movie where the Duke or Lord is trying to marry off his pasty-faced, effete son. The father talks about his building a castle on swamp.
The first one fell into the swamp, so he built a second one, and it fell into the swamp, so he built a third, and it stood.
Now, taking away whatever political swipes Python may have been making in this scene and the general silliness of it all for a moment, you have to admire the man's tenaciousness.
He was determined to build a castle that would stand, and despite the hardships, he finally did it.
Our local business owners in Atmore are displaying that same kind of resolve today.
Roofs are on the mend, ceilings and carpets have been stripped out, damaged furniture and equipment is set to be replaced.
People are working without the benefit of air conditioning and putting in long days to get their stores back up and running.
The resiliency is a welcome sign that yes, there is still life in this town's economy. It would have been easy to simply take that insurance check, hang up a "for sale" sign and be done with it.
In fact, just the opposite seems to be true, those damage checks are being used to restock inventories and remodel stores. If anything, our town businesses may likely come back better than before.
It's not all roses and candy, of course.
We have a long way to go before we get back to where we were before the storm. It will take many long days of hard work. We must be willing to invest in our community and believe in ourselves.
Just take a look at our local business owners. They're not throwing in the towel and neither should you. Remember, you decided to call this place home for a reason.
Small communities have survived tumultuous times before. People called upon that frontier work ethic and self-sufficiency to make things work.
If you want to see that same spirit today, take a walk down Main Street.
Arthur McLean is the editor of the Atmore Advance.