Celebrations and Negations

Today Muslims all over the world will be celebrating Eid.

Eid al-Fitr is one of the two official holidays in Islam. It is celebrated on the first day of the Islamic month of Shawwal and marks the end of the month-long fast observed during the month of Ramadan.

Eid al-Fitr (Feast of Breaking the Fast) is an extremely important religious festival observed by Muslims worldwide. It the former of the two Eid holidays in Islam, the latter being Eid al-Adha, therefore is is also referred to as the Lesser Eid.  - - Anyday Guide

Did you know that Monday, March 31st was originally scheduled as a day off for students in the Howard County Schools?  But, when the Board of Education looked at how they could make up school days lost to snow, they choose this day to be reinstated as a school day. 

Things I cannot tell you: if they understood how this would impact Muslim students, or if they knew and did not care. I can’t pass judgment on that because I do not know. I do know that this decision was extremely disheartening to Muslim families. 

Surely this is a decision that has made them feel invisible and unheard. Christian holidays are protected in our school calendars. We will never have school on Christmas or Easter. Apparently respecting Muslim holidays is just something nice you do if it’s not logistically inconvenient. 

I understand that making up school days is complicated. I don’t understand this.

*****

Today is International Trans Day of Visibility.

International Transgender Day of Visibility is an annual observance that occurs on March 31. It was created to celebrate transgender people around the world and raise awareness of discrimination they have to face.

International Transgender Day of Visibility was first observed in 2009. It was founded by Rachel Crandall, a transgender activist from Michigan, United States who felt that the LGBT community lacked holidays dedicated to transgender people. The only existing transgender-related observance at the time was the Transgender Day of Remembrance which mourned transgender victims of hate crimes but didn't acknowledge living members of the transgender community or address their issues. - - Anyday Guide

Last Friday the Howard County LGBTQIA Commission and the Howard County of of Human Rights & Equity hosted a community celebration of  Trans Day of Visibility at the Elkridge 50+ Center. 

Good for them. 

Forces outside of Howard County are demanding the persecution and erasure of trans Americans. Inside of Howard County we are continuing the work of acceptance and celebration. And thank goodness for that.

*****

I am not trying to create any kind of equivalence by posting these two things side by side. They happen to fall on the same day this year by chance. Both are a part of who we are in Howard County whether they impact us personally or not. 

Perhaps you are not a Muslim. You may not even know anyone who is a Muslim. Perhaps you are not transgender. You may not know anyone who is transgender. 

Are you human? Do you care about treating those around you with humanity?

Today is a very good day to do that. Tomorrow, too.

Village Green/Town² Comments

The Seen and the Unseen: Columbia in the News

 

Meanwhile, back at the ranch…

Residents to Columbia Association: Leave our facilities alone, Jess Nocera, Baltimore Banner

I found this article to be helpful in shedding some light onto the current CA controversy. Big news: even if you don’t subscribe to the Banner, you can read it, too. The Howard County Library System has added the Baltimore Banner to its collection of free online resources.

Heads up: you will need your Library Card barcode and PIN to do this.  

1. Go to HCLS website
2. Click on Online Resources
3. Under “Download”, click on enewspapers
4. Under Current Enewspaper Issues, click on Baltimore Banner 
5. You will neeed the barcode and PIN for  your library card account to gain access.
6. Next, you will need to enter the designated code to gain free access.

Whew! You’re in!

Now you just need to find the article. You can search using the handy-dandy magnifying glass icon, or you can simply scroll down until you find it.

Even if you don’t want to read the article, you should still go through these steps for two reasons. Firstly, it’s good to have the ability to access news through the library. Secondly, I’d like you to look at the photographs that accompany the article. (Photo credit: Ulysses Muñoz)

I sighed when I saw the photos of the CA meeting. Can you tell why? Yet again news from the Columbia Association shows us predominantly white people of a certain age. 

We are doomed. Doomed, I tell you.

Deep breath. 

This is not to negate the issue at hand nor to cast aspersions on the people who showed up. But it’s never a bad time to remind ourselves that the New American City was not meant to turn out like this. At least, I don’t think it was. 

“But that’s not the point!” you might say, especially if this particular issue is important to you. And I guess you’d be right. But the longer I live here, the more I’m convinced that it’s always the point.

Village Green/Town² Comments 

 

Spring into Saturday

 It’s Saturday! Got plans? Here’s a small sampling of what’s available. 

It’s the annual CAMOM Children’s Consignment Sale from 8:30 am to 12 pm. (See stipulations above.) Please note: it’s in a new location this year: Trinity Episcopal Church on Route 1 in Elkridge. 

The Community Ecology Institute is hosting a Volunteer Day at Freetown Farm from 10 am - 3 pm. They’ll be doing tree planting for stormwater management.

The Movement in Music Ensemble is presenting a free concert this evening at Hammond High School beginning at 7:30. The program features Fuchs Serenade memorized and choreographed, plus a selection of works honoring Black and Indigenous composers. Here is the link to register for your free tickets. 

If you’re just getting your day started you might want to take a look at the March issue episode edition of The Merriweather Post.

The Merriweather Post, March 2025

I’m in complete agreement with the advice that the best thing we can do for the local restaurant scene is to patronize the places we love.

So, while it’s certainly fun to anticipate and try new places (new restaurants are exciting!), I’d encourage readers to keep frequenting and supporting your long-time favorites as well with your limited dining dollars.

Another reminder that I should have picked the Common Kitchen over 7 Eleven for Thursday night’s dinner. Sigh.

If you have any exciting local plans for the weekend, I’m all ears.

Village Green/Town² Comments

F ³: Joy and Convenience

 

I was headed out to a concert last night in River Hill and thought I’d add to the fun of it by picking up dinner at Clarksville Commons. I went to their website and looked over the list of current food vendors. I pondered steamed momo, the novelty of a glizzy hot dog, or some Indian street food. Mmm…

But first, I had to get gas and I headed to our shiny new 7-eleven because I have the app and I get a discount. Plus, it’s convenient. 

Something happened to me as I stood there pumping gas. A little voice inside me said, “You could just run in and get a sandwich here and be done with it.” I wouldn’t have to park at the Common Kitchen, walk inside, wander around, make a decision…It would just be easier, wouldn’t it?

And that is how I ended up eating a chicken salad sandwich on squishy white bread which came wrapped in a plastic exoskeleton and some strawberry wafer cookies packaged in cellophane. Because it was convenient. 

I drove away pondering the concept of convenience. So that’s why they call it a convenience store, I thought. 

I could have had a wonderful food adventure. Something delicious, out of the ordinary and without question better than dinner from 7 Eleven. But in that moment the lure of the convenient far outweighed the potential variables of something across town. This realization weighed heavily on me.

The concert was a balm to my wounded spirits. Howard County Shredfest is a gathering of guitar students and performers who are involved in the new Modern Band course. It is similar to the assessments that other performing ensembles participate in - - kids from different schools perform for one another, there is an adjudicator to give feedback. There the similarities end. 

When I arrived students were wandering about onstage, checking instruments and amps, playing a riff or two, testing out keyboards. My husband’s students wore matching T shirts but the rest of the outfit was up to them. That is why one was sporting plaid pajama pants and two others were wearing shorts. 

Shredfest is an event where it doesn’t matter what the performers are wearing and where self expression is as big a part of the experience as meeting musical proficiency benchmarks. You’re not there to judge their physical appearance. You are there to enjoy what happens when they work together and share what they have learned. 

The first piece of the evening started out a bit rough. (It’s hard to be the opening act.) The song was “One Hand in my Pocket” by Alanis Morissette. As they got to the third verse something changed. The vocalist hit her groove and you felt her confidence as she sang. The guitarists responded. Everyone’s focus increased. The ensemble jelled. The singing was beautifully resonant and in tune. The audience felt the excitement.

At that moment the airplane had made it off the runway and had taken flight. And everyone felt it.

Joy broke out in the auditorium. It was the joy of doing what you love and taking the risk of sharing that thing with others. It was the joy of entering the zone, experiencing that state of flow and taking an audience along with you.  

Joy and curiosity are the same thing. Joy is always a surprise and often a decision. Joy is portable. Joy is a habit, and these days, it can be a radical act. Keep your nose to the joy trail.

- - Anne Lamott 

There is wonder in joy. There may be perfectly good reasons why you experience joy and yet it is still a surprise. It is in the “wow” that you feel at that moment. It may come in silence at the sight of a flower or with a surge in a room full of guitars. 

Curiosity, wonder, surprise, joy. All palpably different from convenience.

I did make the easy choice on dinner. There’s no denying that. If I had made the easy choice on my evening I would have stayed home in my easy chair and done the things I always do. It would have been convenient.

Last night I chose convenience but then I chose joy. I didn’t know I was choosing joy until it happened. It was a surprise.

And what it all boils down to

Is that no one's really got it figured out just yet

Well, I've got one hand in my pocket

And the other one is playin' a piano

And what it all comes down to, my friends, yeah

Is that everything is just fine, fine, fine

- - Alanis Morissette

Shh. Don’t Tell Anyone

I admit it. I’ve never understood the rah-rah enthusiasm for the University of Maryland. I’m not from these parts originally. I started out life in Cleveland, Ohio and I can’t remember anyone we knew being enthusiastic about Ohio State. When we lived in Connecticut UCONN was considered by many to be a “safety school” rather than a first choice. 

I’m not talking about the actual quality of those academic institutions. I’m talking about local attitudes. So I guess I arrived in Maryland with those engrained prejudices - - that one didn’t go to the state school by choice but because one had to for one reason or another.

Maryland is different. The outright enthusiasm and loyalty that people have for UMD is impressive. I couldn’t begin to list all the bright, capable, interesting and accomplished folks I know who spent their college years in College Park. And they’re over the moon if their kids are accepted there, too. It’s almost a religion.

Color me perplexed. 

I appear before you this morning to announce my complete admiration for the University of Maryland. I have been won over not by tradition, nor academics, nor the fierce terrapin mascot, but by a frog. 

There it is. I’m a sucker for Kermit. And, as far as I’m concerned, it’s a brilliant move to bring Kermit the Frog, a creation of the late Jim Henson UMD ‘60, to speak at this year’s commencement ceremony.

Institutions of higher learning are under attack these days. Intellectual inquiry and diversity of thought are now considered to be problematic at best. Imagine how difficult it might be to select a commencement speaker in this environment. The eyes of MAGA are upon you. 

Choosing a puppet might seem like a cop-out, a safe choice. But this puppet is no puppet, if you’ll forgive my choice of words. And that’s because Jim Henson was a true creative: visionary, playful, entrepreneurial, and not afraid to play around with the status quo. There’s intelligence in Kermit, and thoughtfulness, too. Whether one is drawn to that famous green frog because of his humor or awkward charm, those qualities can’t be separated from his innate yearning for goodness and his earnest understanding of his own imperfections.

Time after time we root for Kermit as he tries to bring his friends together to make something wonderful happen.

• Intelligence
• Thoughtfulness 
• Humor 
• Innate charm
• Yearning for goodness
• Understanding of once’s imperfections 
• Bringing people together 

Friends, this looks a whole lot like genuine leadership. Doesn’t it? Choosing Kermit the Frog isn’t a silly or academically unserious choice. It’s almost a subversive choice. If there is a path for genuine democracy in this country it most certainly will require more Kermits.

Shh. Don’t tell anyone.

And so today I salute you, UMD. Leading fearlessly forward with a frog to meet the moment. Well done. 

Village Green/Town² Comments

No Invisible People

 

One year ago today I could not write. The news from Baltimore about the Key Bridge loomed over the day like an enormous cloud. 

Six construction workers perished:

Miguel Ángel Luna González, Alejandro Hernández Fuentes, Dorlian Ronial Castillo Cabrera, José Mynor López, Maynor Yasir Suazo-Sandoval, and Carlos Daniel Hernández. 

Today I want to send you over to Baltimore Beat to read a piece about the workers who lost their lives that night and how the Baltimore Museum of Industry is working to honor them.

No invisible jobs: Baltimore Museum of Industry exhibit will highlight immigrant workers who died in the Key Bridge collapse, Grace Hebron, Baltimore Beat 

“They were living and working what is, in many ways, a typical experience for immigrants who come in and do that middle-of-the night work that nobody else wants to do. We wanted to honor that,” BMI’s executive director Anita Kassof told Hebron. 

There’s no paywall. There’s never any paywall at Baltimore Beat.  

It’s a free paper. Subscribe and it will come to your inbox. At the same time, it is distributed in print from specially made Beat Boxes within Baltimore. And since it is a free publication, they rely on donations. The seed money - - a $1 million gift from Baltimore-based Lillian Holofcener Charitable Foundation - - got them started. Continued financial support, both big and small, keeps them going. 

You really can’t find the kind of work that they do anywhere else in Baltimore. It matters that they tell those stories. We can’t know what we don’t see and we can’t care about what we don’t know.  

Right now the powers that be are systematically scanning government databases and removing every story that is not white. Struggles, accomplishments, bravery, contributions: if they were Black or brown or LGBTQIA or women or…(it goes on and on) their stories and honors are being purged. 

Who will push back against this suppression of America’s story? Independent news organizations who make it their mission to speak the truth about their communities are in the best position to do that, because they are doing it already.

Just as many folks these days don’t seem to understand that the value of vaccination comes not merely in protecting oneself from illness but also in protecting those around us, I think we sometimes forget that supporting this kind of journalism isn’t solely about its value to us personally. When we invest in independent local journalism we are also making that information available to others, as well. Think of it as herd immunity against sensationalism and disinformation. 

Rather like libraries. But that’s another story altogether. 

If my blog post today had a subtitle it would have to be: 

No invisible people: Baltimore Beat highlights the stories of Baltimore that other media outlets neglect.

Village Green/Town² Comments

Learn more:

Baltimore Beat

Baltimore Museum of Industry 

Getting Around Town

 

You may have noticed that I just can’t seem to let go of certain things. Over the years certain themes resurface with some regularity. 

Here’s one: public transit. Way back in 2013 I had a zany idea for a transit-oriented summer camp option. 

Just had a brilliant, brilliant idea. CA and hocogov need to partner on a camp/recreational course for kids where all activities involve learning how to use Howard County Transit to get to the activity site. You want to change attitudes about public Transit? Kid + fun + knowledgeable, adequate supervision. 

I returned to this concept in a post entitled “The People on the Bus” in June of 2023 when I learned that the RTA was making presentations in HoCo high schools to help students learn how to ride public transit. 

My parents used public transit a lot, I used it some, my children very little, if at all. Yet there are compelling environmental reasons to use public transit instead of individual automobiles. What would we need to do to turn the use of public transit in the other direction?

A recent Facebook post from Glenwood Academy caught my eye.

Image from Glenwood Academy social media 

Practicing a mock "Uber drive" - learning how to access various modes of transportation- our scholars practiced scheduling the ride and meeting the "driver"

Glenwood Academy is a nonpublic special education facility that works with students who have language-based learning differences. (I wrote about them last Spring.) Learning how to independently navigate the multiple steps involved in using a ride-sharing service is a valuable life skill. No, it’s not taking public transit but it is a hands-on educational experience that will give students more autonomy. I like that.

Truth in advertising: Glenwood Academy is no longer in Glenwood. They moved to Eldersburg during the summer of 2024 because they needed a facility with more space. Do students from Howard County still attend Glenwood? Yes, they do. Which means that, as far as I am concerned, Glenwood Academy is still a local story for the purposes of this blog.

I still think that public transit is important and that it’s a good investment to teach kids how to use it. They should feel confident that they can get around town safely and successfully.  It can (and should) become a part of how they experience our community.

It’s also true that ride-sharing services have become an accepted mode of travel and it’s good to know how to use them, too. Embedded in a simulation like the one at Glenwood Academy are numerous skills that these students are working on daily in an “academic” sense. Truthfully, something like this could be equally valuable in a public school setting, if it were possible to dedicate the time to make it happen. 

Autonomy. Independence. Success. Safety. There’s a lot to be gained in learning how to get around.

Village Green/Town² Comments