Embracing the Local Community

below is the start of a nice writeup.  be sure to check the link for the remaining posting

The Ozarks. The Sonoran Desert. The Green Mountains. Death Valley. In my life I’ve called them all home. Like so many people I move for work, for new opportunities. I’m a park ranger, traveling every season to a new destination, a new natural wonder, a piece of American history. And being able to travel and live from coast to coast, I have come to believe that there are unique qualities in every part of this vast country.

As a ranger I look at the land first. I love moving to new parks and new ecosystems, to suddenly be looking at a forest of cactus, or thick hardwoods, or a slow meandering river. The second thing I look for is a hike into this new territory. And the third thing? Town. I find the grocery store. The library. And it’s amazing, because every nearby small town is just as unique as the park itself. There’s the dusty failing boom town on the Nevada border. The small mom-and-pop towns scattered throughout southern Missouri. Or the pretty town greens of Vermont.

I believe that it is a combination of the land, and its history, and its people, that makes these places unique. I’ve seen it almost everywhere I’ve been. Communities protecting their local identities, embracing their local histories, and celebrating their local ecology. I’ve seen these communities struggling to re-claim themselves from an often de-personalizing and sprawling modern life. I believe that community-identity can be created, and like all of the towns I’ve lived in, this identity can be created by embracing the local woods (be they mangroves or fir trees) and by embracing the local community, with its markets and libraries, historical societies, and businesses.

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