Whatever Happened To…?

Oakland Mills Village Center

This is just to say that

I visited

The Village Center

yesterday

without a jacket

and maybe

Spring really is

coming

for real.

The flowers are blooming

and the dancers

look hopeful.

Come, pick a book

From the Little Free Library.

They are plentiful - - juicy and delicious - -

for your soul.

I’ve been thinking a lot about the Columbia concept of Village life recently as April elections approach.

Courtesy of Columbia MD Archives. Unknown publication.

Columbia is a city of villages.

It was always intended to be a city. Look at the icon and the accompanying slogan on the lower right. But at the same time it intended to ground itself in the smaller communities of village life.

If you read the promotional text you will see what parts of the vision came true and which did not. It’s clearly more aspirational than outright factual in nature. For example, what’s this about a branch library and junior and senior high school near each village green? Wilde Lake comes to mind, and they did have a branch library early on. Did any other village come close?

Does every village even have a village green?

Do most residents see villages merely as locations for aging, outmoded shopping centers?

Is the concept of Columbia as a city which is rooted and nourished by a kind of small-town village life still alive today?

When we ask people to run for CA Board or, at the very least, participate in annual elections, what does that mean to them?

It’s too early to be sure, but it seems to me that this year’s elections are shaping up to be a contest between those who support the Board faction whose behavior led to the resignation of the CA President, and those who vehemently do not. There’s definitely a sense of us vs. them, choosing sides, picking teams. I guess that's only natural given recent events.

But where do villages fit in all this? Are we losing those identities that Rouse saw as vital to the New American City? Or were Columbia’s villages merely ‘themed housing developments with shopping centers’ wrapped in slick, utopian-sounding packaging?

When CA board members are elected and sworn in, who are they representing? What way of life are they working to sustain?

Columbia is a city of villages.

What does that mean to you?

Village Green/Town² Comments

Comments

Teacher Gifts

Today is the last day of school before the Winter Break. It’s a good time to remember the far-reaching nature of our public school system. You may not have children. You may have sent your children to independent schools. It matters not. You will be impacted one way or another. Yesterday I read a long thread on Facebook about several waves of illness in the schools right now. There’s influenza A and norovirus, I believe. And of course there’s COVID. Apparently in some individual schools the rate of illness is high enough for school admin to notify parents. When I was little the acceptable holiday gift for a teacher was one of those lovely floral handkerchief squares. (I don’t know what it was for male teachers. They were rare in my elementary years.) These days the range of teacher gifts is wider and I have fond memories of Target gift cards which I have written about before. I think it’s safe to say that giving one’s teacher Influenza, norovirus, or COVID is not the ideal holiday...

They Can Wait

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Columbia Chance Connection

Last night, as my husband and I were about to sit down to dinner, our front door swung open and a cheery voice announced, “I’m ba—ack!” We weren’t expecting anyone. Clearly the only people who’d walk right in to our house would be one of our offspring. I had my reading glasses on so I wasn’t seeing too clearly. It seemed too tall for our youngest, but we knew our eldest was at work. I took off my glasses to see a friendly but confused face scanning our living room. When her gaze landed on us we all had a sudden realization. We didn’t know eachother. “Oh I’m so sorry! I’m in the wrong house! My daughter just moved in and she needed hooks for the kitchen so I ran out to get them.” She waved the package. “All these houses look the same and I don’t know the neighborhood yet. I thought this was my daughter’s house.” We were all getting a bit giggly. “That’s okay. For a quick second we thought you were our daughter,” said my husband. I told her our names and said she should defin...

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