Part 6 of my vision for Crookston

I’m sorry to be so slow getting this out to you, do you remember the other five parts? They are: Part I, Slow down, make it beautiful, and peaceful, Part II Address Parking once and for all, Part III antiques, collectibles, thrifts make a great destination, Part IV Bring people downtown through affordable rental housing, events and UMC, Part V create the best schools ever and after attending a recent 'strategic planning' session, I must say our goals must be much much higher, why not a magnet school for math, science, and engineering? or fine arts? or the highest GPA sports students ever?

Finally here is Part VI: Everybody talks to each other and everybody has meaningful work. Ok, I know, that’s two goals in one. Think though, if everyone talks to everyone else either by the Crookston Daily Times Guestbook, or email, or on the phone or in person, everyone would indeed have meaningful work because of our relationships with others, talking about our problems, and working together to solve them. And I must make one qualifying statement, and that is, we speak to each other while keeping our best manners, and our most open mind. Using our minds to concentrate and really listen. To respect all races, all income levels, and to take the time to have those conversations. Believe me I know its easy to say and tough to do, and sometimes when I try, I get slapped in the face, but oh well, its not the end of the world or anything.

And since I have only found part time work so far, I have spent my time thinking about Crookston and writing grant applications. Plus I’m an introvert, not a talker really. I should have gotten out and about and talked with as many people as I could. Surely there is someone somewhere who could put me to work full time in and around Crookston. Many times I thought to myself “I have no skills! Stupid Bachelor’s degree in marketing means nothing! The American Dream is dead! How will I pay the next bill!? But the Lord has provided and people in Crookston have been kind.

And so we must all continue to be kind, fair, and hopeful for Crookston. 50% are on the federal free school lunch program and I suspect the rate is higher than that, 18% Hispanic population, lots of homelessness, people on disability, and those that are trying to help them. But it takes a village to raise a child, a village to start a business, and a village to communicate with parents, teachers, community leaders, those doing the laundry for the hospital, and the hospital executive director. The leaders and the followers, the sports people and the arts people, the farm kids and the town kids, the poor kids and those from families more well off. I’ve found over the years that if you talk long enough, you will find something to connect you to the other person and then fear goes away, and new opportunities arise.

One thing we could do right away is add a “Time Dollars program” to our community. Imagine the young helping the elderly for time-dollars that they can go spend to obtain other services that they need. A person called “mmaps” on the Crookston Times Guestbook said that Crookston has a service base, not a retail base, and that’s true, so why not capitalize on it, and if the retail sector can afford it, they could join in and redeem time dollars as well! Imagine it! The homeless helping the poor non-profits with their works, and proving their worthiness to hire, the smarter kids helping those that need tutoring, parents helping teachers, teachers helping parents, people could apprentice again if paid in time dollars, not real dollars, kids could get some useful skills instead of one shop class in their whole life. Instead of a strings tied government program, we could help ourselves with our own teams of "Youthbuild" or "Self Help Housing" the list could go on and on. But it only works with frequent respectful communication.

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