If you don’t count trips to the doctor and pharmacy drive-though, I pretty much haven’t been anywhere since March. A few visits to my daughter and son-in-law’s house nearby. A Buy Nothing porch drop off. That’s about it. I occupy a weird health situation and I am luckily able to live accordingly, a point of great financial privilege, I know. In addition, I get to do this with two other humans who love me and who help sustain my emotional well-being.
I have no room for complaints.
Still, life gets a little small over here. And I wonder if, when this is all over, I will become the person you are more likely to run into at all those in-person community events. Will I be so ready to forsake this time of isolation that I jump at the chance to attend those retail openings, community meetings, government hearings, etc? It might happen, I suppose. It makes me smile to imagine it.
Yesterday I found myself behind the wheel of my car driving over to Freetown Farm to pick up an item I had won through their online auction for the MakerSpace. I’d never been there but seen plenty of pictures, so it felt familiar as I turned in. I had a brief exchange with a friendly staffer in the blustery November air and I was on my way. Before I left I walked over to a grouping of chairs to catch a closer look at a wood sculpture that had caught my eye: a woodpecker.
It’s about the same size as the chair beside it. Seeing it reminded me of the work of Oakland Mills wood/chainsaw artist Evelyn Mogren, who lives just a bit down the road from me. Ms. Mogren has done a variety of work locally including pieces for the Girl Scouts at Camp Ilchester. (See their video of her work here.) You can also find some of her pieces at the Robinson Nature Center.
I’ve reached out to Ms. Mogren to see if the woodpecker is also hers. Just curious about another local story, I guess.
Simply driving around town yesterday with Public Radio on (my goodness, I’ve missed those people!) was practically a special event for me. It’s amazing how one’s perspective changes. As much as I don’t encourage a world centered around recreational driving, this was a moment of personal freedom which perhaps contributed to a bit of a mental health break.
Yes, I should definitely get out and take more walks. But at the moment my carbon footprint is so small that a trip to Freetown Farm was just what the doctor ordered.
The Community Ecology Institute, which runs Freetown Farm, started a fundraiser on Giving Tuesday and it looks like you can still pitch in.
Cultivating Community at Freetown Farm
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