Recognizing Community: At Home and Work
A community often simply is defined as a group of people who live in close proximity to one another. But community can be much more. Or, we should work to make it much more than just a pile of people living beside one another.
In the barest sense, my home community is South St. Paul. I lived in a
neighborhood of teachers, administrators, school nurses, lawmakers. But it was more than the skeletal definition of community.
My community, as a kid, was tight knit. I think this stems partly from the fact that the city had its own thriving economy based upon the stockyards and affiliated businesses. Families could earn a solid living, buy a home, send kids to a good public school. Once out of high school, kids could work in the 'yards, buy their grandparents home, and start a family. People didn't leave. There was no need to. Everything you needed was there: Housing, good jobs, grocery stores and car dealerships, clothing stores and bakeries, bars and churches.
South St. Paul was a place where kids in summer threaded in and out of one another's homes, used the bathroom or grabbed a glass of water or an apple. At night, neighbors ate dinners together in one of the backyards and then the kids played Kick the Can until the fireflies came out. Many of us married kids from town -- someone we knew from church or who lived next to our friends or cousins on the other side of town. Our dads drank beers with other dads at the Croatian Hall and the Polish National Alliance.
We looked out for one another, had shared values, some shared histories, and links that were social, economic, and political.
I didn't realize this until I left South St. Paul. I saw it in hindsight. All the stuff I
didn't like as a kid or a young adult, I "get" now. I didn't like that, as a kid, if I was behaving poorly down the block, someone was guaranteed to see and reprimand me. Nobody called my mom. They just dealt out the discipline themselves. I didn't like, as a young adult, walking the dog in my home neighborhood and having to talk to no fewer than 5 people -- all the moms or dads of kids with whom I grew up -- about what I was up to now, how my family was, what was next.
I get it now. It was community. People who cared about me, my wellbeing, my family, my safety.
It's something I'm now trying to find and build in my new-ish neighborhood and work place.
With the thought of "community" in my head, here's what my "Favorite and Thankful" looked like yesterday, February 4, 2014.
Favorite: February 4, 2014 -- The parking lot in which I park is across the street from the building in which I work. The problem is that Minneapolis has gotten so much snow that getting from the parking lot to the building is somewhat treacherous.
There's no curb cutout or crosswalk, and we all are too lazy to walk the half block to the corner to safety cross. It would mean being outside in this truly frigid, well-below-zero weather.
So we all play mountain goat. We climb up the snow bank, with its irregular terrain. Some parts of the bank are soft and you sink to your knees with each step. In other places, dustings of snow disguise the hard icy chunks of snow that, when you step on them, roll to the side and nearly wipe you out.
Playing mountain goat is almost fine until the footprints ice up and you end up sliding down a 3-foot bank into traffic. It's stupid of us to insist on this form of navigation, but many in my parking lot community do just this.
When I arrived at work the other day, the Facilities crew had used a Bobcat Skid-Steer to bite a chunk out of that snowbank. I think they saw me, at my wits end last week, hacking at the snowbank with the grain shovel I keep in my car during winter. I made a feeble path 12 inches wide through the bank so it was a bit easier for my parking lot cronies to get through.
The 'cat chewed through the snow in only about four bites creating a nice opening in the snowbank of about 5 feet wide. When you walk through this ad-hoc crossing, it's surprising to realize that the snow bank is up to your chest.
My favorite part of the day was realizing that the ethos of this place is to look out for one another. It was demonstrated by someone from Facilities creating a reverse causeway for passersby and lazy parkers.
Thankful: February 4, 2014 -- I tend to do things in spurts. Sometimes even binges. This week, it struck me that I have scheduled lunches in the College cafeteria every day. It's not something I normally do. Sure, I'll have a lunch on occasion on campus and with a colleague. But not every day of the week. That's just goofy and unproductive and too much time away from my office. Things are booked, however, and I'll follow through.
It struck me last night when I was pondering my "Favorite and Thankful" for the day that this embarassment of riches -- of being in a community where I can have lunch each day with a different person or group -- clearly is something I should celebrate.
When I was offered my current position, I misunderestimated (see Quote 3 at the link and in the words of President George W. Bush) the impact of job culture change. I held my previous public relations position for nearly 10 years. I made good friends with whom I still connect. I had the chance to grow my skills, work in different areas of the organization, and be part of different work teams. But I still was part of the same overall culture even though I didn't quite see it.
Nearly three years into my post at Augsburg College, I feel I have the start of a community. There are people here with whom I am fortunate to have lunch, some with whom I have a beer now and then, others with whom I spend a spot of weekend time. There are people that make me laugh, that challenge me, that always seem to be teaching me things.
I'm so very grateful to be here, to have the joy of meeting students from across the globe, to be able to attend convocations with guest speakers, to be able to look for ways to help faculty showcase their expertise in the media, to be part of a Marketing and Communications team that is full of witty and funny and compassionate people who truly know their craft.
I'm thankful to be here. I'm going to frame my busy social lunches this week as a testament to the community of which I now am a part. Doing so makes me realize how many more people with whom I need to schedule a coffee, lunch, or happy hour.
Community. I'm fortunate to unknowingly have come from one that now is a model to me. I'm thankful to be finding and creating community in my new neighborhood and at work.
In the barest sense, my home community is South St. Paul. I lived in a
My community, as a kid, was tight knit. I think this stems partly from the fact that the city had its own thriving economy based upon the stockyards and affiliated businesses. Families could earn a solid living, buy a home, send kids to a good public school. Once out of high school, kids could work in the 'yards, buy their grandparents home, and start a family. People didn't leave. There was no need to. Everything you needed was there: Housing, good jobs, grocery stores and car dealerships, clothing stores and bakeries, bars and churches.
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| Throughout the 1900s, South St. Paul had a thriving economy, many churches, a good public school. |
South St. Paul was a place where kids in summer threaded in and out of one another's homes, used the bathroom or grabbed a glass of water or an apple. At night, neighbors ate dinners together in one of the backyards and then the kids played Kick the Can until the fireflies came out. Many of us married kids from town -- someone we knew from church or who lived next to our friends or cousins on the other side of town. Our dads drank beers with other dads at the Croatian Hall and the Polish National Alliance.
We looked out for one another, had shared values, some shared histories, and links that were social, economic, and political.
I didn't realize this until I left South St. Paul. I saw it in hindsight. All the stuff I
 |
| Aerial view of the Armour slaughterhouse, packing plants and headquarters. |
I get it now. It was community. People who cared about me, my wellbeing, my family, my safety.
It's something I'm now trying to find and build in my new-ish neighborhood and work place.
With the thought of "community" in my head, here's what my "Favorite and Thankful" looked like yesterday, February 4, 2014.
Favorite: February 4, 2014 -- The parking lot in which I park is across the street from the building in which I work. The problem is that Minneapolis has gotten so much snow that getting from the parking lot to the building is somewhat treacherous.
There's no curb cutout or crosswalk, and we all are too lazy to walk the half block to the corner to safety cross. It would mean being outside in this truly frigid, well-below-zero weather.
So we all play mountain goat. We climb up the snow bank, with its irregular terrain. Some parts of the bank are soft and you sink to your knees with each step. In other places, dustings of snow disguise the hard icy chunks of snow that, when you step on them, roll to the side and nearly wipe you out.
Playing mountain goat is almost fine until the footprints ice up and you end up sliding down a 3-foot bank into traffic. It's stupid of us to insist on this form of navigation, but many in my parking lot community do just this.
When I arrived at work the other day, the Facilities crew had used a Bobcat Skid-Steer to bite a chunk out of that snowbank. I think they saw me, at my wits end last week, hacking at the snowbank with the grain shovel I keep in my car during winter. I made a feeble path 12 inches wide through the bank so it was a bit easier for my parking lot cronies to get through.
The 'cat chewed through the snow in only about four bites creating a nice opening in the snowbank of about 5 feet wide. When you walk through this ad-hoc crossing, it's surprising to realize that the snow bank is up to your chest.
My favorite part of the day was realizing that the ethos of this place is to look out for one another. It was demonstrated by someone from Facilities creating a reverse causeway for passersby and lazy parkers.
Thankful: February 4, 2014 -- I tend to do things in spurts. Sometimes even binges. This week, it struck me that I have scheduled lunches in the College cafeteria every day. It's not something I normally do. Sure, I'll have a lunch on occasion on campus and with a colleague. But not every day of the week. That's just goofy and unproductive and too much time away from my office. Things are booked, however, and I'll follow through.
It struck me last night when I was pondering my "Favorite and Thankful" for the day that this embarassment of riches -- of being in a community where I can have lunch each day with a different person or group -- clearly is something I should celebrate.
When I was offered my current position, I misunderestimated (see Quote 3 at the link and in the words of President George W. Bush) the impact of job culture change. I held my previous public relations position for nearly 10 years. I made good friends with whom I still connect. I had the chance to grow my skills, work in different areas of the organization, and be part of different work teams. But I still was part of the same overall culture even though I didn't quite see it.
Nearly three years into my post at Augsburg College, I feel I have the start of a community. There are people here with whom I am fortunate to have lunch, some with whom I have a beer now and then, others with whom I spend a spot of weekend time. There are people that make me laugh, that challenge me, that always seem to be teaching me things.
I'm so very grateful to be here, to have the joy of meeting students from across the globe, to be able to attend convocations with guest speakers, to be able to look for ways to help faculty showcase their expertise in the media, to be part of a Marketing and Communications team that is full of witty and funny and compassionate people who truly know their craft.
I'm thankful to be here. I'm going to frame my busy social lunches this week as a testament to the community of which I now am a part. Doing so makes me realize how many more people with whom I need to schedule a coffee, lunch, or happy hour.
Community. I'm fortunate to unknowingly have come from one that now is a model to me. I'm thankful to be finding and creating community in my new neighborhood and at work.
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