Willimantic, Now & Then
So here’s the thing. I think we get a lot from our community: Education, water, neighbors, friendship, waste removal, roads and snow plowing…the list goes on. Our community needs something from us, and I think it’s time we gave it up.
We Can Get There From Here!
Sarah and I will talk to a group of people this month about what we see as a sustainable future for Willimantic.
I have been thinking, talking and, occasionally, writing, about sustainable life for a while now, and yet it’s a pretty elusive concept.
So, on September 3, we’ll get the chance to trot out some of our ideas in front of people at the monthly Creativity Networking event in Willimantic. These events are hosted by Steven Dahlberg, of the locally-based International Center for Creativity and Imagination.
These events are designed to explore ways of using creativity and imagination to build healthy communities. I believe this might be just what the doctor ordered.
I once had a rule in my house: For every thing I brought in, I had to get rid of something as big or bigger. I made this rule at a time when I was working with my friend Tony Clark, moving furniture for people in Willimantic. I saw, very clearly, the folly of too many possessions, and I had access to many castoff things.
By Mark Svetz
WILLIMANTIC –September, 2008
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Sustainable Community:
I was living in a small room at the time and I saw where my habits were leading me. This was the essence of an unsustainable life. There is, after all, a pretty finite capacity to 100 square feet of living space.
Now, as I think about a sustainable community, I recall how my simple rule kept my life in balance through 10-15 years of handling an amazing array of cast-off stuff. Balance is the key here. I think we have to give up something for everything we get.
I’m thinking we’re gonna have to get pretty creative and imaginative, pretty soon. Even if we all decide to start buying locally, what will we buy? Where will we buy it all?
Maybe it’s time for us to start looking at what we can’t buy locally, and think about making it to sell to our neighbors. For countless generations, our communities have come together and stayed together for the purpose of trade and commerce. It is part of the energy that keeps our communities healthy and strong.
In the 30 or 35 years I have lived in Willimantic we have lost so many locally-owned places to buy the things we use every day. It saddens me to think about all the things I used to buy from my neighbors: shoes, housewares, records, books, clothing of all kinds…and again the list goes on and on.
In each case, we lost not only the opportunity to buy something from our neighbors and keep more of our money in our community, but we also lost jobs.
Now, we are pretty much forced to buy much of what we need from corporate outlets. We only have to drive down Main Street in Willimantic, from, say, Bennie’s, oh, excuse me, Lot’s & More, to Shaw’s out by the Mansfield line, to see what that looks like.
The jobs they create are for the most part, part-time, minimum-wage jobs, suitable for high school kids, really.
But are there real jobs, to keep our own children here after high school or college? I am beginning to see, the answer is no.
Locally-owned businesses have a much better track record for the jobs they offer. They offer the full range from summer jobs for kids, up to manufacturing and management positions with a future and no commute.
So that is my thought about a sustainable community: We need to figure out a way to put our talent and energy to work in our community. Never mind chasing the gold ring of higher wages to some corporation in Hartford or Groton, or even Storrs.
The cost is too great for us as individuals and for the community. Too much traveling. Too much time. Too much gas. Too much of everything, with nothing left over to give to our community.
We have gotten way out of balance.
Our community is bleeding talent, energy, experience every morning along the commuter arteries. We need to stop the bleeding.
I’ve been fortunate in my life. I have almost always worked in the community where I live. Even when Sarah and I lived in New York City for a decade, I worked most of the time in my neighborhood. I have only commuted once in my life, when I worked for the Norwich Bulletin.
I haven’t always been conscious of my “career,” but I’m proud of the work I’ve done, and I love the relationship I have with my community.
So that’s where my thoughts about a sustainable community take me: To the realization that we must collectively apply our creative energy to figuring out how to plug up the energy drain and and get a job in our community. Or, better yet, make a job for ourselves in our community.
Who knows, we might end up making a few jobs for our neighbors in the process. I’m pretty sure we’ll make a stronger community.
Mark Svetz and Sarah Winter own Clothworks, a shop on Church Street in Downtown Willimantic, where they make and sell clothing and bags. Stop in a ask them about the joys of running your own business!
The corporations build a big box, sell the cheapest imports for a few years, then move on. If we’re lucky, another corporation comes along and uses the big box, but only after filling our landfills with the debris from the total remodling they did.
Just the other day, a friend referred to these corporations as the world’s worst litterbugs because of all the junk they leave behind.
Park Springs
A lot of us are getting the picture about buying locally. That is one way we can give back to our community. It also happens to be a way we can protect ourselves from the hazards of modern corporate practices, such as contaminated food, exploitive labor practices and unchecked pollution.
Area Farmers’ Markets are flourishing. The Willimantic Food Co-op is doing a great business, with more and more goods from area farmers.
The idea of buying locally seems to be catching on, and I hope that grows in the years to come. But I’m thinking it’s not enough.
Late night Brainstorm on the Footbridge
