Village Green/Town²

This link takes you to Ovetta Wiggins, the Washington Post reporter who exposed the story of Maryland Delegate Mary Ann Lisanti using a racial slur to refer to residents of Prince George’s County. Perhaps you’ll want to give her a follow on Twitter. This link takes you to an article by Luke Broadwater and Pamela Wood in the Baltimore Sun about where things stand on this issue right now. This link takes you to a Change.org petition calling for Lisanti to resign. Using the word that she used disqualifies her from public service. Regardless of her stage of inebriation, that word would not come out of her mouth if it hadn’t already been in her head and in relatively common usage. It shows that she does not view all constituents equally. Period. And now her constituents know it. And the citizens of the State of Maryland know it. And if we do nothing we might as well endorse racial slurs ourselves. We must not be silent.

I read the news a bit wistfully: the old Durgin-Park Restaurant was no more. Back when I was in high school and our class visited Boston on the American History trip, a visit to Durgin-Park was a must. They were known for classic New England dishes and for their waitresses who were, to be blunt, rude. That’s right, people flocked to Durgin-Park to be insulted by the waitresses. They wouldn’t bring you dessert unless you cleaned your plate and, even then, might give you the once-over and ask if you really needed it. And people just adored it. Somehow there was a market for humiliating people in a social setting. Durgin-Park was the best of the best. Now it’s gone. So, too, is the humor of comedian Don Rickles who made quite a successful career out of insulting people. Whatever will we do without them? Don’t fret, though. I’ve found a local joint where you can go to get insulted and it won’t cost you a cent. No cover charge, no tipping a surly waitress.  Just pure, unadulte...

I have a drying rack that I use for those items that  shouldn’t go in the clothes dryer. The last time I took it out I noticed that one of the joints/hinges is just not right. It won’t open all the way, so the entire rack doesn’t open and sit properly anymore. My husband and I both fooled with it to see what the matter was but: no dice. Then I saw this announcement about the free repair event at The Barn (not The Other Barn) in Oakland Mills this Saturday:  What great timing! I wonder if they can fix my poor drying rack?  Dubbed  “ SkillShareFair & Repair Cafe”, the event is a joint venture between the folks at Columbia Time Banking and Transition Howard County. In addition to individual repairs, there will be mini- workshops presented by area Time Bankers on topics such as: Patch a Hole in a Wall  Hang a Heavy Picture Homemade T-Shirt Bags  Sock Darning  Bugs that Bite  Screen Repair  This all ta...

You may have seen that the Columbia Association is proposing a change in status, through state legislation, from an HOA to a Community Benefit Association. What does that mean, exactly? Old Columbia, circa 1979 I haven’t had the time to get into this in detail yet, but I will tell you what I do know. The HOA act doesn’t adequately apply to the Columbia Association. It’s never been a good fit. For instance, there are lienpayers of CA who are businesses, and constituents who are not lot owners. One of my knowledgeable sources put it this way: CA should never have been a homeowners association. It is so much more than a homeowners association and quite frankly a lot of the random bills regarding homeowners associations really shouldn't apply to CA or, for that matter, the villages. CA spends a fortune in lobbyist fees to exempt CA from these regulations. It seems to me that, in this context, CA is moving to correct its status to one that fits better with who they ...

One of the local notables I follow on Twitter is Matthew Winner, a librarian/media specialist in the Howard County Public Schools. In addition to his day job, Mr. Winner hosts a podcast about children’s books and maintains an active social media presence . Yesterday I noticed a discussion in his feed about Dr, Seuss. It starts here . You will see a discussion between Mr. Winner and an account called  @TheTinyDiplomat about Dr. Seuss and Read Across America. It contains a link to this piece: A Critical Race Reading Of Dr. Seuss Now, you may have already known about this; I hadn’t. But as I read it I knew it to be true. Dr. Seuss books are completely centered in whiteness and view anything that differs from this norm as exotic, humorous, less competent, sometimes malevolent. He has a history of wearing blackface in minstrel show activities, and, try this on for size: there are absolutely no girls of color in any of his books. @TheTinyDiplomat is the Twitter account of stu...

I came across something on Twitter this morning that stunned me yet somehow didn’t surprise me. It’s about Dr. Seuss. You may think that Dr. Seuss doesn’t have a local connection, but if you’ve ever had a child in a local school you know that Dr. Seuss is on the menu annually. More about that tomorrow. Here’s a piece I wrote for Columbia Patch in 2013. I was surprised to see you can still find it. I suppose this qualifies as my very first Benign Unpopular Opinion. Cat in the Hat? No, Thanks! I hate Dr. Seuss. No, I don't. I dislike the work of Dr. Seuss. I hate the Cat in the Hat. It is easy to get confused since Dr. Seuss' birthday, Read across America Day, and the Cat in the Hat character have been fused into one giant educommercial-edutainment complex. I taught Preschool, I taught Kindergarten, I have two children, and I hate the Cat in the Hat. I hated it when I was little, and I still do. Let's look at it from a child's point of view: a smiling stranger ...

No, absolutely not. There’s no way I’d drink two gin and tonics on a school night. Well, alright. Yes, yes I did. And before all that lovely joie de vivre wears off I’m going to write a blog post. Motivation tomorrow morning may be nil. If you know me well, you’ll know I was there for this week’s taping of Elevate Maryland. This particular episode was the second in what I hope will be an ongoing History Makers series. I do think we are making a lot of history these days in Columbia/HoCo, and not just of the political variety. So, stay tuned. The evening’s guests were the newly appointed Chief of Police and Fire Chief, Lisa Myers and Christine Ulhorn, respectively. I’m not going to get into the nitty gritty of what they said but I do think that we’re all in good hands with these two capable women in public safety leadership roles. The combination of their deep knowledge of their departments combined with a sincere desire to build bridges in all areas of the community impre...

Yesterday my daughter was facing down an assignment for an English essay. “I just can’t do it! It doesn’t make sense and I can’t do it.” I stepped in with a bit of Mom Wisdom. “I write about 365 blog posts a year,” I told her. “About how many of those days do you suppose I wake up and think, ‘I can’t do this!’” She gave me the look of a teenager enduring adult advice. “About 300,”  I concluded. “I know I can’t do it and then I do it anyway. And you can, too.” And, eventually, she did. But, guess what, devoted readers? Karma is a comin’ in for Mom this morning. I woke up with that old familiar feeling: I can’t do this. Funny how that works. This is the time of year when I usually write my obligatory Why You Should Run post about CA and Columbia Village board positions. It appears that Jason Booms of Spartan Considerations has already done it. His goes into more detail about his own personal experiences than mine usually do. He suggests: You have to have at lea...

Newly elected Board of Education member Dr. Chao Wu made no secret of his support for STEM education during the election campaign.  (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math.)  Yesterday Dr. Wu unwittingly became a prime example of why Humanities education is so important when he chose to share an anonymous post which essentially justified segregation in Howard County Schools. It has since been taken down and replaced with this . Here is the original.  I should add that this post is a response to the information in this blog post by Dr. Richard Kohn, entitled “How Did Howard County Schools Become the Most Segregated in Maryland?” What Dr. Wu shared with his readers is essentially a piece that attempts to justify segregation. It provoked concern, anger, and a deep sense of hurt from members of the Howard County Schools community. Only after the damage had been done did Dr. Wu retract the post and state that he had only been trying to start a discussion on the...

Having a bad case of the Mondays. On a Tuesday. Plenty of ideas swirling but none of them will hold still long enough to be written about. Let’s try this on for size: does anyone know the history of the Lark Brown Restaurant Park? It exists in that mythical place I like to call “the other side of town”, so we don’t go there often. At the entrance there is a cluster of permanent “flags” that have such a decidedly dated feel that I have often thought one risks going back in time merely by turning down that road. I Googled them to find a photo, but no luck so far. Unpopular benign opinion: the Lark Brown Flags are a local landmark. We found ourselves looking for a place to eat dinner last night while “on the other side of town” and ended up at TGI Friday’s. It’s at the end of the road. We passed a now-deduct Exxon station, a McDonalds, Olive Garden, Bob Evans, and the ever-popular Royal Taj to get there. It is kind of wonderfully subversive to have a true local mom and pop resta...

I should’ve taken more pictures. Well, if I had gone with the intent of writing about it, I probably would have. But my motivation for attending the Clarksville Commons Great Chili Cookoff was to support the charity, Grassroots, and to support the folks at Clarksville Commons. They are working really hard to be a community hub and I like that. Anyway, here’s my artsy photographic pastiche of the event: First off, the event was held in the Porch Room of Food Plenty, which is the Farm to Table/local foods restaurant located upstairs at Clarksville Commons. I had never been there so I enjoyed getting a chance to explore the space. I don’t have a lot of adjectives at my disposal right now to describe it but how about: fresh, calming, simple. Now for the chili. Five of the merchants from the Common Kitchen participated: Great Harvest Bread, Koshary, Namaste Foodie, Scoop & Paddle, and Trifecto. The sixth entrant was event host Food Plenty. My tasting experience was enhanced by ...

This week County Executive Calvin Ball signed an Executive Order to create an Office of Human Rights Review Committee.  One of the recommendations made from my Transition Team is to thoroughly review the operation of the Office of Human Rights and review the existing investigation process. OHR is responsible for administering and enforcing provisions of the Howard County Human Rights Law, investigate complaints and attempts to eliminate violations by conference, conciliation, and persuasion.  Therefore, I signed an Executive Order this morning creating an Office of Human Rights Review Committee. This is an opportunity to identify ways we can strengthen the office, so it becomes the gold standard for all local Civil Rights Agencies.  The usual naysayers that congregate on the County Executive’s  Facebook page had a field day with that.. The responses seems equally divided between: 1. Anything Calvin Ball does must be bad, so let me condemn this. 2. omg he ...

As promised, I’m returning to the subject of teens and voting. I got some thought-provoking feedback after “ Minors Go Major?”  last week. More than one respondent pointed to the activism of young people following the shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkand, Florida. It is certainly true that we saw teens motivated, educated, active, and involved in the election process over the last year. Some pointed out that many folks over the age of 18 are woefully uninformed about candidates and issues yet we do not use this as a reason to prevent them from voting. Everyone agreed that America could do a much better job educating children, teens, and adults about the political process, how our government works, and a citizen’s  responsibility to vote. Several people tactfully pointed out that the areas of concern I raised about sixteen year olds voting have been used in the past a barriers for the right to vote for the disabled, African Americans, and women....

I seem to have a lot of things on the back burner right now. Maybe they’ll all come to fruition over the weekend. A follow-up to my post about teens getting the vote   An introduction to Free State Justice  Can competition lower gas prices in Columbia?  Is a bag tax the end of the world in Howard County?   Everyone I know is in the news. What’s up with that? If you’d like to read something more coherent today I recommend this Valentine’s Day post by HoCoBlogger Mike in ThrewMikesEyEz. A Thinking Thursday Lots to think about and his photos always make me smile.

  From the Howard County Times: The weather pattern that brought snow and ice across Maryland this week is forecast to resume this weekend, bringing light snow and likely some slush around the region. Me: Why don’t we talk about Summer Reading? I asked Christie Lassen from the Howard County Library about the annual summer reading program. Summer Reading  helps stop "summer slide," the tendency for students, especially those from low-income families, to lose some of the achievement gains they made during the previous school year. Howard County Library System's free summer reading program encourages kids, teens, and adults to read over the summer by offering prizes for reading any types of materials (e.g., books, magazines, news articles) and/or completing various types of activities.  This year's theme relates to space (an especially great tie-in to this year's Evening in the Stacks Otherworldly theme), and our staff is planning a ...

It looks like the Maryland General Assembly just may return the control of school calendars to local jurisdictions. I am in favor of this move, to put it mildly. I will not go over my reasoning point by point today. We’ve been there, and done that. There is just one thing. (Cue Columbo in the doorway.) The biggest reason I have seen for starting school after Labor Day is “We did it that way when I was young.” I have now officially reached my limit with that argument. Here, for your edification, are a random assortment of things that “we did when I was young.” Girls were required to wear skirts or dresses to school regardless of the weather. Airplanes caused “sonic booms” over residential areas. Women smoked cigarettes and drank alcohol while pregnant. Women could get fired for being pregnant. One could be fired/arrested for being gay. Air pollution was widespread. Women couldn’t get credit in their own names. Lead paint was legal and widely used. The Buddy Deane Show...

As promised, here’s some info on where that money from Evening in the Stacks is heading every year. I asked Christie Lassen, Director of Communications and Partnerships, to point me in the right direction on this. Here’s what she said about Battle of the Books: Proceeds from Evening in the Stacks benefit educational initiatives such as Battle of the Books, an academic competition for fifth graders who read 13 assigned books then answer questions about them. More than 300 teams (1500 students - or about one-third of Howard County fifth graders) will compete in April at this event, which has become a rite of passage. It's grown so much that it now takes place simultaneously at six high school gyms. To give everyone an even starting point, we provide each team with a set of books -- something we are able to do thanks to generous support from our community. A piece of Battle of the Books trivia for you: Sara Toth, former education reporter for the Howard County Times, loved ...

My beloved father-in-law, Sam McCready,  slipped away from us late last night. In his last days his son Richard played music for him and his wife Joan read to him the poetry of William Butler Yeats. He was surrounded by family. We held his hand, we embraced him, we offered up the kinds of prayers and love and good thoughts that open the way for a safe journey. He was a storyteller , as I have said, but he was also an actor. And for him this little theatre that is my blog will remain dark today in his memory.

I tried something new this week. I needed some books for my classroom so I went online and ordered them. Half of them came by the next day! The rest, the day after that. It was amazing. No, I’m not talking about Amazon Prime. I’m talking about the Howard County Library. I needed some children’s books to supplement my science unit on animal patterns. I sat in my comfy chair at home, went through the online catalog, made a list of what I wanted, and then clicked “Request”. The folks at the library did the rest. Think Amazon Prime, think Instacart, think absolute convenience, but think something else: absolutely free. My students are going to love these books and the Howard County Library made it as easy as possible for me to bring them into my classroom. While I was at the East Columbia Branch picking up my books, I bought a raffle ticket for this year’s Evening in the Stacks fundraiser. It was the least I could do, after benefiting from all that Library goodness. The...

I didn’t grow up in a church. The hymnody of my youth was a combination of Rodgers and Hammerstein musicals and the songs of the Beatles. When I got to high school, the songs of the early Beatles were having a resurgence. I bought a newly released collection of their music and played through the volume on my trusty Yamaha guitar. For me, every situation probably has a corresponding Beatles song. Your own particular generational allegiance will, of course, vary. When I saw a “Beatles love songs” event advertised at the Soundry, I immediately asked my husband if he wanted to go. He was noncommittal. I was sad. For about two seconds. Then I bought two tickets anyway. A while later I told him that I had bought two tickets and, if he wanted to come, great. If not, I’d take someone else. Worked like a charm. Last night at ten to seven we were part of a very healthy line waiting to get into the Soundry. I snapped photos of the Lakefront at night. My husband noted the age of th...

I’m way behind in listening to my favorite local podcast, “ Elevate Maryland ”. I’m only about a third of the way in to the episode featuring my new Council representative Opel Jones. And there’s still this week’s episode with Council member Christiana Rigby to delve into. Ah, weekend. I intend to do some catching up in the listening department. An issue that Jones raised that surprised me was a goal to lower the voting age to 16. He cited the interest and activism of local teens in his reasoning to change the law. Maybe I’m just an old fogey, but I don’t agree. I think sixteen year olds are still in a position to be so heavily influenced by their parents vote as to compromise the independence of their choices. When we think about how minors are in a position to be abused by those in a greater position of power, it is the difference in age and status that puts the young person at risk. I’m inclined to believe that this puts a teen voter at risk, as well. Does granting sixteen y...

I just want to sleep. My alarm went off at five am, as it always does, and I just want to sleep. I’m already pausing between sentences to close my eyes. “I don’t really have to write,” that little voice inside my head tells me. I could take a day off. I could run an old post. My eyes close again. What’s on my mind this morning? This: On January 31st, five members of Start School Later Howard County testified at the Budget Hearing to ask for the necessary transportation money to ensure healthy, safe, and age-appropriate school hours for ALL Howard County Students. If the BOE doesn't ask for transportation money, neither the County executive, nor the County Council can fund improving school hours.  Please email the board at BOE@HCPSS.ORG to add your voice to the discussion.  If you agree that our students deserve safe and humane school hours, you can write them and urge them to include funding for the necessary transportation in their budget. From Start School Late...