Village Green/Town²

  Is it possible that we have arrived once more at the time of year when locals are campaigning for votes as though their lives depended on it? No, I don’t mean the Maryland primary election.  Today, June 30th, begins the voting period for the annual Howard County Magazine 2022  Readers Choice Contest. You are invited to vote daily in the following categories: HEALTH & WELLNESS SHOPPING RECREATION PERSONALITIES OUT & ABOUT FOOD & DRINK As you may have figured out, this contest is a click-fest. It is a way of showing which businesses or local figures can muster the kind of loyalty entailed in signing in and clicking daily. For businesses, winning this can be a big deal. It looks great on one’s promotional materials. As for bloggers, well… There was a time that winning this meant a lot to me. I suppose I thought that it would carry more clout than it actually does. In the long run, it didn’t necessarily open more doors for me or cause hocolocal notables to show ...

  I knew it would come to no good. And I was right. In November of 2015 I wrote about the dangerous precedent   set by the introduction of on-street parking spaces in front of the Metropolitan building in Downtown Columbia. Parallel parking. There are multiple parallel parking spaces in front of the shops at the Metropolitan. How can they do this? No one in Columbia knows how to parallel park. They've just taken it off of the drivers exam, for heaven's sake. Granted, there's only a handful of spaces, but somebody needs to take a stand now before this gets out of hand. Last night my daughter and I headed over to Mod Pizza for dinner and were flummoxed by the sight of a car double parked with its flashers on, parallel to the parking lane. We waited for a moment to see if it might move out of politeness.  Nope. As we passed by on our way to the parking garage we noticed two things. The car was completely empty, windows rolled down, almost as though the occupants had bee...

One of my favorite hocolocal businesses, From Momma’s Kitchen, will cease operations as of June 30th. Owner Monica Rogers Williams is moving on from baking to other professional pursuits. It’s not too late for you to have one last delicious fling with the tasty baked goods Williams has been cooking up over the last eleven years. She’s offering Good Buy sampler boxes in a variety of sizes. Visit her website if you’d like to choose one. But, do it now. June 30th is approaching quickly. From Momma’s Kitchen  I’m not exactly sure what is coming next for Ms. Williams but I hope she will continue to follow her dreams . 

  Yet again, local blogger Suzi Gerb has written a piece that caused me to say, “wow, I wish I had written that.”   The right to traumatize children , Suzi Gerb I wrote a piece in a similar vein last week. I was reasonably proud of it.  Rage, Rage Against the Dying of the Light Gerb’s is better. Mine leans towards righteous indignation. Hers is buoyant: gentle, even tender, while devastatingly truthful. She asks the reader to change their own perspective, to put themselves in the place of a queer child. For an LGBTQ+ child born to a family and a culture that sees them as wicked and dangerous, the schools are all they have, all that holds them back from a lifetime of anguish.   Ms. Gerb makes a point I hadn’t pondered enough. The parents who wish to restrict or ban affirming activities and/curriculum see themselves as protecting their “normal” children from those who are “different”. They may have no idea it is their own children who need this information most of all...

  This is going to be brief. I don’t have it in me to do much more than that. - - jam ***** I just discovered that Howard County has a country club. I really had no idea. I can add that to the list of things I hadn’t known. They’re in Glenwood, which is in Western Howard. You probably knew that. Cattail Creek Country Club How did I find out? The Howard County Fire and Rescue Services Facebook page shared a notice yesterday about an upcoming fireworks display. Reminder: TONIGHT (6/25), at approximately 9:30 pm, there will be a private fireworks display in the 3600 block of Cattail Creek Drive. Residents might hear loud noises/see smoke in the area. This event is permitted through the Office of the Maryland State Fire Marshal and will have HCDFRS fire marshals present during the display. So Howard County has at least one country club (are there any more I don’t know about?) and they had their very own fireworks display last night. CORRECTION : A kind reader has pointed out that Turf ...

  This post is from March 26, 2014. My grandmother, who worked throughout her career to support reproductive health and care, is on my mind this morning. Frankly I’m glad she didn’t live to see this day. Jen Raffensperger is no longer a blogger. She is an ordained Unitarian Universalist minister. Heritage, or: My Grandmother the Birth Control Activist We called her Gaga, because one of my older sisters couldn't say Grandma. She wore very colorful suits and sparkly costume jewelry. She was a pretty terrible cook. She didn't bake cookies and she wasn't very snuggly. She was, as my mother put it, a "career woman." Here you see a mention of her passing in the newsletter of the National Council for Family Relations.  Maternal Health. I grew up knowing that's where Gaga worked, but I had absolutely no idea what went on there. I only truly came to understand when she died, in 1978. I was almost twenty. The magnitude of what she had done began to hit me as I read her ...

  “It's easier to fool people than it is to convince them that they have been fooled.” – Mark Twain. We need to talk about the rabid onslaught of misinformation surging through social media and erupting at school board meetings across the country. It has a catchword: grooming. The term “grooming” is being used to mean something it absolutely does not mean, with the purpose of attacking and stripping away any programs and/or materials that support LGBTQ + students and families. It’s not just that “grooming” isn’t happening in our schools in any coordinated way. It’s that the word is being used over and over again to mean something it does not. To paraphrase that old viral meme: That’s not what that means. That’s not what any of this means. The success of bad actors to use a word that has a frightening connotation - -  that most people only know just a little bit about - - to fan the flames of outrage is alarming. I spent my entire career working with children in educational se...

  There’s no lack of local things right now to write about. There might be too many, I suppose. But the little light switch that goes on in my head to allow me to write is malfunctioning this morning. Perhaps it’s a lack of sunlight. Perhaps there’s just too much to assimilate.  Here’s a sampling: The current political season  The County Executive’s announcement of an LGBTQ+ Commission Upcoming Independence Day festivities in Columbia/HoCo Final days of the old Talbott Springs Elementary School New restaurants opening CA Board meeting reviews on The Merriweather Post: citizen journalism? Upcoming girls and boys Nike National High School Lacrosse Showcase at Blandair Park, to be televised live The Board of Education race Local attitudes towards renting vs owning  Why e-scooters? That last one: not a criticism. I’m just curious. Bonus question today comes from the Columbia Conversation account on Facebook: Do you consider Columbia a city-like suburb or a suburb-like c...

  So it turns out that yesterday was National Selfie Day (who knew?) but I’m pretty sure that the photo I featured in yesterday’s blog does not qualify. This one:  But, while I was contemplating what a picture of Columbia looks like, the Columbia Association was gearing up for a different kind of photo project. From their website: Become the Face of Columbia Association The best thing about Columbia is YOU! We’re making updates to the CA website to make it: Faster to find facility information Clearer to learn about programs Easier to get involved in Columbia’s best activities We need you! … to help us show the places and spaces that make Columbia unique. And you get access to the professional photos of you and your family for FREE. Volunteer to be part of our upcoming photoshoots. Everyone is invited, everyone is welcome Individuals Groups of friends Couples Whole families What’s involved? Come and enjoy our programs and facilities – have fun, no matter your membership level S...

  A reminder from the Columbia Association that today is a red-letter day: Lookin' cool at 55! Happy birthday Columbia, we couldn't be more excited about your future. #HappyBirthday #ColumbiaMD #ColumbiaAssociation #DowntownColumbiaLakefront It doesn’t seem that long ago that we were celebrating Columbia’s 50th does it? A lot has happened since then. I had a few thoughts as I looked at this photo. It is, of course, Columbia founder Jim Rouse’s statue at the Lakefront. It occurred to me that this close-up does him no favors. It reminded me of the times my mother would see someone famous, or someone she had known long ago and say, “My, he’s aged.”  Really, his “skin” is looking pretty terrible. Most of us wouldn’t look a whole lot better if photographed at this distance. It’s hardly flattering.  It made me wonder how Columbia itself would look in this kind of (metaphorical) closeup. Original buildings have aged, of course. Some are gone. New buildings have been pushing up t...

  On the Federal observance of Juneteenth, I have a few thoughts. Yesterday I saw a social media post which began:  Juneteenth is a uniquely American holiday… And why is that, do you suppose? Because it is uniquely American to build an entire country on the labor of the enslaved? We should be deeply troubled as white people to reckon with the concept that Juneteenth is a uniquely American holiday.  Something worth celebrating would be if a Juneteenth had never been needed. That’s not the path that colonizers chose. Imagine all the different choices and all the different attitudes that would have been necessary for that to be so. I thought a lot about this quote yesterday: Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.  – George Santayana, The Life of Reason, 1905.  We are facing an angry wave of anti-history sentiment right now in this country. People don’t want to remember the past or learn things about the past that they did not know. They don’t wan...

  Dan and Claudia Zanes We were there for it, as the young folks say, from the moment the announcement was made and we snapped up our tickets. @macsmom (yes, that's me)   Just booked my tickets to see @danzanes and @claudiazanes at the Chrysalis! So excited! The Chrysalis Kids series is back at @InARTrust ! Bonus: getting a retweet from Dan Zanes himself. I first learned about Dan Zanes from an interview on Public Radio, around the time that his Parades and Panoramas CD was released. I went home and told my husband how cool he was. We bought the CD and were immediately hooked. From there it was a quick jump to his kid-centric, all ages music - - we did have a young daughter at the time. And, of course, I taught preschool music.  Songs like Jump Up, Mairi’s Wedding, All Around the Kitchen, Wonder Wheel, Catch That Train, and so many more became frequent companions in our lives. Good friends, even. When I began doing my kid’s dance parties at the Chrysalis, one song in part...

  Remember how hot it was yesterday? Our former neighbor came across a dog inside a hot car in a shopping center parking lot. This was not in Columbia/HoCo, but, it easily could have been. A long-time professional dog trainer and lover of dogs, our friend knew just what to do. She called the police to report it and waited with the car. In the meantime she tried the door. It was unlocked. She opened it to give the dog some air and offered a dish of cool water. The dog, who was panting, happily lapped up the water. In case you are wondering, of course she had a dog dish and water available. She’s just that kind of person.  The police came and talked to the family when they returned. It seems that they had gone inside to eat dinner in a restaurant and just locked the dog in their car. They acted surprised that there was any law pertaining to what they had done. “Funny how they didn’t leave their kids in the car,” our friend wrote angrily in her Facebook post recounting the incide...

Usually I get frisky on Fridays but today is different. Today is the last day of school. We have a lot of people to thank.  Our society has deemed that schools are one of the few places where all must be accepted. No person (or particular group of persons) may be excluded. That means that schools are tasked with meeting the needs of all children order to support their educational progress. All children. All students. No exceptions. There are plenty of folks who are of the opinion that schools should be in the business of providing the best possible experience for their own particular children, or for the children of “people like us.” As loud as they may be, their voices are not the voice of public education. Schools are for all children.  I could say more but you probably don’t have all day. Here’s the important part: We must not close the door on any school year without saying thank you. Schools are made up of teachers, admin, paraeducators, speech, occupational, and physica...

The featured color at Colorburst Park this Saturday is Blue. The Columbia Democratic Club is inviting the community to a free event that they call The Big Blue Block Party. It’s this Saturday, June 18th, at Colorburst Park in the Merriweather District. As of now the weather forecast indicates a high of 73 and sunny. That’s pretty darned promising for an outdoor event. What’s happening? There will be food trucks, music provided by DJ Jonathan Stoddard, and an opportunity to try out those new e-scooters. @ColumbiaMDTweet: Need to be gently guided into your first #escooter ride? The folks from @ridespin will run demos from 12-2. If you are a yoga aficionado, there will be a free 30-minute yoga class at 10:15 am provided by special guest YogaSix. (You will need to bring your own mat.) Truth in advertising: there will also be information about Columbia Democratic Club-endorsed candidates and opportunities to register to vote if you haven’t already. Basically, the goal of the Big Blue Block ...

  Between end-of-school-year celebrations and political events, a lot of you are probably maxed out right now. Still, you might have time for something completely unrelated…and fun. Tonight, at Black Flag Brewing Company , you can attend an evening of board games hosted by Aleventures. As always, here’s the tweet that caught my eye:   While you're there, enjoy a Haze and Haze Accessories IPA if you think you'll like a light and fruity IPA with Incognito and Spectrum hops. Or try one of their many other delicious refreshments! Aleventures is an event-hosting company based in Frederick, started by Ryan Chite and Michael Sayago in 2021. According to an article in the Frederick News Post, it all came about like this: Occasionally, the pair would take board games to play at local bars and breweries. They always wondered why bars do trivia nights and not board game nights. “I think when you’re sitting down on your weekends to play board games and drink beers,” Sayago said, “natur...

  Meanwhile, after most of Columbia/HoCo has already been there, I have finally made it to  The Food Market. I’ve read plenty of glowing reports online. The stars finally aligned in such a way that I was enjoying an outdoor lunch with a friend.  I noticed when I stepped inside to the host station that absolutely no one I could see was wearing a mask. I’m sure there’s plenty of that going on these days, just not for me. I regret I didn’t have an opportunity to take a look around the interior of the restaurant. Google images supplied some inside views, which are consistent with the outside area: it’s modern. Lots of metal and glass. No unnecessary ornamentation. There’s a metal fence around the outside dining area which is probably meant to define the space.  It felt to me a bit too much like I was being fenced in. I was half worried they wouldn’t let me out when the meal was over.  I indulged in my drink of summer, a gin and tonic. I honestly can’t remember the ...

  Happy Monday. Yesterday morning I got stuck trying to connect several things into one cohesive thought. I’m not sure I’ve got it all together, but, I’m going to put it out there anyway. It started with this photo and its accompanying tweet: @redhumbersider: In the Czech Republic’s second city, Brno, you can travel 15 minutes on public transport to a municipally owned & run outdoor swimming pool fed by spring water, surrounded by a forest. Why can’t British politics be about giving nice things to ordinary people? It had been retweeted with the following comment: @marcelineawhite: It would be lovely if people in Baltimore without cars had access to any of the lovely parks, forests, and swimming holes in Maryland. People without cars should also have access to nice things such as nature. Back to transit. Yep, it returns to the forefront of my brain yet again.  Columbia/HoCo boasts so many beautiful, natural settings that are preserved and maintained for the enjoyment and we...

  Last night as I looked at posts on Facebook from happy friends at Lakefest, I realized I hadn’t really written a darn thing about it. My apologies. On the other hand, there has been so much online promotion I feel sure that most people know by now. This picture made me smile:  Long-time Columbia residents are familiar with these statues at the Lakefront. Often referred to as simply “the Rouse Brothers”, the statue by William Duffy is called “Dealings.” From the Columbia Association website: “Dealings,” a bronze life-size sculpture by William Duffy, portrays James Rouse, founder of Columbia and The Rouse Company, and his brother Willard, who served as executive vice president. It is the only sculptural representation of James Rouse in the city he created and was installed in July 2002 by CA in honor of Columbia’s 35th birthday. James Rouse died in 1996; the statue reminds people of his vision for a better city for all people. “Dealings” was originally commissioned in 1986 by ...

  I’m sure you’ve seen the signs, hand-written on spare pieces of corrugated board, held by someone at the side of the road who looks tired and worn: Will work for food. That is not me. I am okay. Even if I did have to retire early, I have some social security income and my husband is still working.  But early retirement means I am looking out the front window a lot more than I used to and savoring the time to observe nature. So I got a bird feeder, a fairly cheap one. The birds loved it. The squirrels destroyed it. So I got a different kind of bird feeder. The birds loved it, the squirrels loved it, and the deer came down in the night and ate right out of the top of it and chewed off all the little perches to get to the tasty treats inside. So we got another feeder, and attached several Slinkys to the standing pole that holds it up. That just about takes care of the squirrels. And we bring it in every night. That takes care of the deer.  When the weather got hot I began ...

I have a confession to make. Last night, as the heavy rains came down, the winds picked up, and my family took shelter between the furnace closet and the powder room, some very uncomfortable thoughts went through my mind. As I thought of the residents and merchants in Old Ellicott City, and prayed they would  be safe, another layer of dread came into play.  If anything bad happens it will be used as a political football in the campaign for county executive.  Of course that was not my first thought. But it was there, nonetheless. And I felt terrible about it. I’m just going to lay it out there:  If you are inclined to support County Executive Ball you are more likely to have been following the work that County Government* has been doing to mitigate flood risk in Old Ellicott City and believe the County has been making steady progress in this area. If you are inclined to dislike County Executive Ball you are more likely to have dismissed any flood mitigation work done ...