Some ideas come from planning. This one came from paying attention.
Back in 2019, I was in my hometown of Waynesboro, Georgia, helping host a career readiness and job fair event with a family friend who had been doing economic justice work in the area for years. The focus was simple: help people who had been locked out of opportunity get access. Folks coming home from incarceration. Folks trying to clear records. Folks who just needed a real chance.
It wasn’t fancy. It was practical. It mattered.
We called the effort Burke and Beyond, built around a belief that felt true then and still does now: you can get anywhere from here. That phrase stayed with me long after the event was over.
A few years later, in 2023, I was sitting at ADCOLOR listening to a Mississippi-born music executive talk about his own path. While he was speaking, the words dirt road roots came to me out of nowhere. Not as a slogan, but as a knowing.
It felt like something clicking into place. The gears haven’t stopped turning since that moment.
For a long time, I carried the tension of moving through professional spaces while holding onto a rural Southern upbringing that didn’t always translate. Being the only country kid in the room. Sometimes the only Black person. A lot of times both. I didn’t see those experiences reflected back into society in a way that felt honest or whole.
Dirt Road Roots grew out of that gap.
It’s not about looking back for the sake of it. It’s about telling the truth about where we come from and why it matters. About honoring the wisdom, humor, work ethic, and joy that live in rural Black Southern communities without turning them into a joke or a costume.
The dirt roads that raised us weren’t something we needed to escape. They were a foundation. And they still have something to teach us, no matter where life takes us.
If this story feels familiar, you’re already part of the conversation. The Country Club is where we share stories like this, along with culture notes, reflections, and things worth passing down. Pull up and join us when you’re ready.
