WISCONSIN

In a time when everyone is plugged into a device, both at home and in public, it is extremely refreshing to sit in a room captivated by a single person telling a true story from their own life. The sense at the end of the night is that we are a closer community, having shared an intimate moment typically reserved for the best of friends.

In a small town, stripped of distractions, we face ourselves in the mirror of those who know us all too well.

“God breaks the heart again and again and again until it stays open.” —Hazrat Inayat Khan

Living with small town gossip is like sleeping under a heavy duvet, occasionally it gets a little too hot but when you’re naked and alone on a cold winter’s night it’s the only thing between you and the soul-death of solitude.

What would happen if a whole family, community, or bioregion of people were connected by dozens or even hundreds of the same song patterns? And what if they were shared in daily life as part of the delicious food necessary for growing resilient community?

We celebrate and give thanks for the bounty of the land and the harvest that will carry us through the frozen tundra of long Midwestern winters.

How does a musically-gifted, racially-mixed family from Chicago make it in a rural Wisconsin town settled by Germans and Norwegians? Ted and Catherine Parrish, along with their two African-American children, weren’t sure it could be done. But they wanted to try.

It is hard to deny that [Reinette] cares deeply about her community and the people in it; that every action she takes is an effort to speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves —the disenfranchised, the under-served, the animals, the earth.

At the end of the day, I believe that investments in community are necessary for healing what ails us. The communities that Ms. Roggio applauds are thriving because people have committed to them…They have shown a willingness to stay through challenge and hardship in order to build something a little more lovely —even when it is a painstakingly slow process.

“Choice-making beings of many possibilities, we humans live by shared cultural stories. They are the lens through which we view reality. They shape what we most value as a society and the institutions by which we structure power.”