Home Invaders

Box elder bugs have invaded my home. You can see from the photo of my house that there’re a lot of the critters. While most expert advice I have read indicates that they are harmless (although one did say they can occasionally bite), they are indeed “pests.” At first I was content to merely brush them away when they crawled on me. But they are persistent, insistent on returning. I wasn’t very successful in trying to smash the offenders and thankfully so. Another expert said they can stink much as a stink bug does.

So far the best approach seems to involve the vacuum cleaner and the toilet. Could be worse. At least I am not battling bedbugs!

Place Matters: Looking for Mitford

The Amazon.com review pretty much hit the nail on the head:

Mix one part All Creatures Great and Small with two parts Lake Wobegon, sprinkle a little Anne of Green Gables and get: Mitford, the pinnacle of provincial life, where homespun wisdom, guarded tradition, and principled faith are the precepts of good living.

These days Jan Karon’s At Home in Mitford is on my car’s CD player each morning as I drive to work. I long for a place like Mitford. Small town. Southern. People care about each other. Know about each other. Not too much drama. Peaceful.

Oh well, this is fiction and I am only on the first book of the series. We will see if I stick with it beyond the first. But, I can see why it captured my attention as I explore my longing for what I call a sense of place – a place where I belong.

The National Trust for Historic Preservation offers a straightforward approach, calling sense of place:

Those things that add up to a feeling that a community is a special place, distinct from anywhere else.

In writing the blog this morning, I discovered that The National Trust for Historic Preservation has a This Place Matters Community Challenge now through Sept. 15 where you can pick a community and vote to support the community. The winner gets $25,000. 

I am throwing my support behind Orion, Illinois and its attempt to save Main Street. The folks of Orion say:

Our small community of Orion is "Rural America at its Finest!" Volunteers with Main Street Orion work tirelessly to avoid the fate suffered by other surrounding communities empty storefronts, shuttered homes, devalued properties, crumbling infrastructure, and shrinking population. Can it happen in Orion, too? Yes, and it has, to some extent.

The way the challenge works is communities "rally as many people around the grassroots issues of preservation in our communities as possible. This means that unlike a traditional voting-contest, participants are allowed to align themselves with one organization, one time throughout the Challenge and recruit as many people as possible to do the same."

Here's how to help Orion. Join me and see if we can help them out. After all, it's the neighborly thing to do.

And I’ll let you know when I get to my Mitford.

Happy Saturday!

PS Here is a Flickr Slideshow about the project

For a while I fell off the face of the earth

I landed in Batavia, Illinois, a far-far western suburb of Chicago. Long-time readers might be curious about this journey, but for now, I intend to be discrete and mysterious about my detour along life’s pathways.

My new home, a quaint little town clustered along the Fox River, captured my eye immediately when I first drove into the downtown central business district. Yes, there is still a thriving downtown here, not yet lost to the strip-shopping centers which populate west Batavia along Randal Road where every manner of chain store or restaurant is at your beck and call. The mayor wrote this about his town, “Batavia in some ways looks like a town that time has left alone.” This part of the Fox River Valley is lovely, and I am no stranger to the river having once lived in a Craftsman-style house overlooking the Fox for a short time in Appleton, Wisconsin.

While Batavia is doing a fine job of straddling old and new, I found her charm immediately apparent with tree-lined streets of homes ranging from Victorian painted ladies to one classic Frank Lloyd Wright home. I can walk to my insurance agent, bank, pharmacy, coffee shop, and library.

The library features a mural of the art accompanying this post--John Philip Falter's "Fox River Ice-Skating," which was the Saturday Evening Post cover for Jan. 11, 1958. In the upper right corner, you can see the Challenge Windmill Factory, another Batavia landmark. Batavia dubs itself “The City of Energy,” a right fine tagline since it served as home to five windmill factories during its early years, and it has been the home of Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory (Fermilab) for more than 40 years.

Well, that’s a short introduction to my new hometown. More later but don't expect me to write about ice-skating on the Fox River or anywhere for that matter.

Home again, home again, jiggity jig

It’s amazing to see the changes since I’ve been away from home. Suddenly, over the course of two weeks spring waved her magic wand and splashed away winter’s drab with yellow.

Daffodils punctuated the landscape as far north as St. Louis on the return drive along Interstates 55 and 44. And Forsythia shrubs drew my tired eyes away from the boring task of interstate driving. As I pulled in the driveway at home, I noticed the neighbor’s apple tree awash in beautiful blossoms too. Stepping out of the car was a bit of a treat too for you see spring is a little slower coming to more northern climes like Chicagoland.

So, you might wonder, am I happy to be home? I suppose so, but I must acclimate myself again to different rhythms and routines as well as prepare for a new challenge next week. And I miss one certain new member of the family much more than I thought possible. Such is life these days.

Neighbors & f-Words

I think we moved next door to Animal House. No, not every day is this way, but Sunday afternoons in my mind are best enjoyed without a lot of f-this and f-that. I’ll cut the guys some slack, because I do vaguely remember what it was like to be young.

Last Sunday, there were at least 15 people over there, drinking around the swimming pool and being loud and obnoxious as I imagine college students are prone to being when they are away from mom and dad. They really didn’t swim, and I am thankful for that. I sneaked a peak over the fence and the water in that pool is murky, algae green. Not good. Poor husband can barely contain himself from going over and offering to clean it up for the guys.

My first house as a grown-up wasn’t a nice one bought by daddy or mom like the house next door. I got married after my freshman year, and my husband and I rented a second-floor apartment close to the University, which we furnished with cast-off second-hand junk. We were too busy studying, going to class and working work-study jobs to care much about the neighbors. But we did get to know them well enough to borrow a ladder to climb in the window the night we locked ourselves out. It is always practical to know your neighbors.

So, guys next door, party if you must—just have it wrapped up it before my bedtime. That’ll be about 10 p.m.