Village Green/Town²

    I’ve got a map for you. Can you guess what it is showing you? No, it’s not hot chicken places. It’s showing you the location of Little Free Libraries in our area that are officially registered with the  Little Free Library organization in Wisconsin  St. Paul, Minnesota. * There’s a new one in town.  Thanks to the good folks in Dorsey’s Search Community Association I now know that a new LFL has popped up on Leyden Way. You can see the locations of many more at their world wide map.  There’s even an app! To learn more about the mission of Little Free Libraries a good place to start is the About Us section of their website. Now I have a question for you. Who are these Little Free Libraries for? If you put one up in your yard, who is welcome to use it? Is it for the people in your neighborhood? Or is it for anyone in the whole wide world? All the information I see is telling me that anyone is welcome to visit the library and take a book. The existence of a...

  My readers truly made my Monday yesterday by chiming in on the Little Tikes “neutral” toy collection. What a wonderful discussion! It was a great way to start the week. A tip of the hat to this suggestion: Maybe Legos could be next - beige Legos on a beige carpet would be so much fun to find... with your foot. Ouch!  To top it off, Facebook got in the act and has started targeting me for adverts for clothing in neutral shades. Gee, thanks. Sarah Sundae has reported that the Rowan’s Dream cupcake fundraiser at Icing on the Cake raised $1,155 dollars! At an overall goal of $60,000 dollars for a wheelchair-accessible van for her son, she is in a long journey. Community response to the cupcake fundraiser has to be encouraging, though. So much of crowdfunding for medical needs these days depends so much on connecting with someone who knows someone who has an idea about someone else who might help. In my opinion that’s not at all how it should work. And yet: here we are. Bushy Pa...

  Did you know?  In recent years the Columbia Association has made a concerted effort to upgrade their network of play areas overall - - you can learn more here.  Columbia Association’s new play area upgrades, explained , April 2026 Columbia’s original Tot Lots (now called  play areas)  were created to blend in with the natural environment. Over the years, as trends in playground equipment have changed, color and sturdy plastic pieces have crept in. As you may expect, this has met with dismay by some Columbia purists. When I first moved to Columbia the color of the playground equipment would not have mattered me one iota because I couldn’t even find the totlots. (“ Looking for a Sign ”, Village Green/Town², 2013)  It has never made sense to me that a community has relied upon new residents to find valuable amenities based upon the theory of , “If you know, you know.”  CA has added much helpful signage since then but, to my knowledge, none of them read...

  So I did make it to Icing on the Cake to pick up a couple of Rowan’s Dream cupcakes . I had a lovely chat with the folks over there and was glad I finally got the motivation to try them out. Icing on the Cake opened in (approximately) December of 2023 and I’ve seen great comments about them from locals on social media. I have no excuse for why their rave reviews didn’t get me out of my house earlier. Possibly it’s because cupcakes are a want-to-have and not a need-to-have.  I do have a question for you. I don’t think I understand that parking lot at all.  Image from Google Maps According to the available signage, you cannot visit any of the businesses on the left side of this photo without taking a free trip around the business on the right side. Am I doing this wrong? Does Victoria Gastropub really want all these extraneous cars doing the loop around their restaurant? If there’s a better way to do this or if you can explain why this makes sense, please let me know. I’v...

  There’s the good news and the bad news. The bad news? A Howard County school bus went the wrong way. Students intervened . Jess Nocera, Baltimore Banner  After Tuesday’s dismissal, a bus carrying Glenwood Middle School students ended up going on an unexpected journey to get home. Instead of taking the usual route, their bus driver brought them across county lines into neighboring Carroll County on Route 97. That’s alarming.  The good news?  There’s no stupid-ass comments on this story at the Banner website. Yet. Having been on field trips with a bus load of preschoolers - - when you realize the bus driver is either lost or just plain going to the wrong place - - I know that creepy feeling in the pit of one’s stomach as the minutes tick on. Do I say anything? Is this an alternate route I’m not aware of? Will the bus driver bite my head off if I attempt to intervene? Now imagine you’re not an adult.  I have seen comments elsewhere that this is a good argument in...

  September 11th is still so close to us that we remember what we were doing that day, who we were with and what we were thinking. Every year we relieve that litany of feelings and events.  Twenty five years ago I was watching children play on the playground. It was a beautiful, sunny day. Then another teacher came over and said, "did you hear?" - - Time Will Dim , Village Green/Town²  I woke up this morning and realized that the students I was with on the playground that day are thirty years old now.  Wow.  In my mind they have never aged. When I was thirty I was newly divorced with a three year old child and beginning my teaching career. I wonder what my former students are doing? Who have they become? What impact did that day - -  and all that followed - - have on their lives? ***** I don’t ever want to pretend I can speak from anyone else’s perspective than my own. I can’t possibly fathom the horror of that day twenty-five years ago for those who were ...