We are arriving at harvest time in the community gardens around town and this invites evaluations and thoughts about what happens next. The farmers markets are going great guns and the State Fair will show us all manner of horticultural and culinary horizons. There are less obvious lessons to be noted having to do with community-building and I would like to invite a look at a website I've put together that showcases a few pictures I took along the way this year - not a lot but telling quite the story.
Here's the URL: http://markusfredric.tripod.com/peacepark/ My thought is that our gardens - and community gardens generally - are life-affirming statements. I'm old enough to remember the victory gardens in World War II. Auth Edith and Uncle Maynard had a big garden out behind the Indian Agency House grounds near the Fox Canal and Fort Winnebago. I stayed with them in 1944-45 and worked oh so grudgingly at age six weeding and picking string beans and the like. This was an adult thing and I didn't catch on to the canning and preserving bit until the late '40s when I was old enough to help my mother and father tend our flowers and harvest our own garden produce. Now I buy stuff from Hmong gardeners and see their kids in the thick of it. Here at the highrise, my British Guianan neighbors [of (British) Indian extraction] explain to me that their country is a agricultural society and show me how to do a better way to manage raised flower beds - something my German immigrant forbears knew nothing about. We have this basic stuff of life in common and I really like being able to bring some pickled beets to share when it comes time for picnics in our Peace Park and then having the chance to sample really tasty Somali dishes. Fred Markus Horn Terrace Ward Ten _______________________________________ Minneapolis Issues Forum - A Civil City Civic Discussion - Mn E-Democracy Post messages to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subscribe, Unsubscribe, Digest option, and more: http://e-democracy.org/mpls
