Jessica:
Glad you made it onto Watercooler! But boy, you ask some tough questions
that may take a lifetime to find an answer. How to build a community? First,
what is a community? An area within certain political boundaries? A
neighborhood? A group of people chatting online about things that interest
them? I think these are all communities, each with a unique way of sustaining
(and building) itself. We are all members of many communities, life being a
multi-faceted process.
I just returned from a trip back to my hometown in upstate NY, where I spoke
to the local historical society on historic preservation. I have not lived
there for 30 years, and yet I felt like I was home. I had shared their news
via my parents and had agonized with them over the loss of town landmarks
over the years. In my introductory remarks, I recalled the demolition of "my"
library -- the mansion of one of the town's most prominent citizens -- as
being the event that led me to the work I do today. Do you know that people
came up to me afterwards and told me how much they related to that incident?
Many of them had felt the same sadness with me. In remembering that loss with
them, the 30 years disappeared. It was as if I had never left them -- I was
and always will be a part of that community because of the connections I had
there made in my childhood.
So I think "community" is a very fluid concept, stretching over time and
place and memory. As for the focusing on the "broad issues" -- I think we all
need to focus on the micro before we can get to the macro. Life is a process
of moving between those two visions.
Mary
