R.E.S.O.U.R.C.E.S.

As I got home from a busy day at work, I noticed some new magazines sitting on the dining room table.  I had never seen these magazines before, nor was I familiar with the title of the magazines, The Minnesota Preservationist.  My husband said they were laying inside the porch when he got home from work.  Attached to the four magazines was a note written on some whimsical, flowery note paper bearing these words: "Mari-I thought that you might like to read these..." Signed "neighbor."  I couldn't have been more tickled by the gesture.  I started to page through the thin magazine, I couldn't believe the amount of information packed into it.  There are an absolute plethora of resources just within this magazine.  There were websites, councils, grassroots membership organizations, historical preservation groups, the list goes on...they are all out there and we must use them to our full advantage!  I felt like someone left a pot of gold at my front door!

As I started to think about restoration and preservation, I couldn't help but think of my travels to Europe.  Europe has managed to keep alive thousands of years of history, yet we have a hard time keeping hundreds of years of history not only alive, but standing.  Here in Windom, we are having a hard time keeping a only little over a hundreds years standing. Why?  Why is it that we think new is better?  Is this the easy way out by tearing down and building new? We need to teach the generations coming how to take care of what we have and what they have--to respect.  It has become so easy to demolish and abuse something because we can throw it out and replace it at the drop of a hat, or for better terms of today, the slide of a credit card.  We have spit in the faces of our founders.  It has become such a way of life that there is now a published magazine trying "to preserve, protect, and promote Minnesota's historic resources."  I apologize, I didn't want this to become the holier-than-thou environmental message, but I guess I'm just trying to find some justification for our actions. 

Protect Endangered Historic Places--this, my friends, needs to be on a bumper sticker on the back of all the hybrid cars in the world (and yours too).

But back to these numerous resources.  Did I mention how many there are?  It's incredible.  Right at our fingertips. If you open magazines, resources.  Internet search engines, resources. Groups, councils, organizations, all resources and all over the state of Minnesota. We even have resources in our own small city.  It's overwhelming just how many resources we have all around us.  Now we need to get our hands dirty.  We need these things to guide us in the right direction, mentor us.  We need to learn from them. Don't tell me things aren't possible.  Don't tell me "that sounds great, but.." Don't tell me Windom can never be a destination city, when we are surrounded by thriving rural, destination cities. All of which have things just like we do, but they use them to their advantage.  They take pride.  They have a vision.  Just check it out on http://www.exploreminnesota.com/.  These things have been around all this time and Windom, with all its potential, has been the lonely kid sitting at a table by himself in the lunchroom of Minnesota.

Finding Windom.

Happy times,