In the Roman pantheon, Minerva was the goddess of wisdom, justice, law, victory, and the sponsor of arts, trade and strategy. Gracious! It boggles the mind that even a goddess could possibly incorporate so many sterling qualities. As it happens, there is a human being who comes close. She lives at Taliesin – “Shining Brow”, named for the famous Welsh bard – and is in her 99th year. The years have robbed her of easy mobility but left her mind intact. Still sharp as a razor, she is almost the last of the apprentices who knew Frank Lloyd Wright personally, as he gathered around himself what was called the Fellowship, the brainchild of the last Mrs. Wright. It was composed mostly of very young people who subscribed to his philosophy of Natural Architecture. They paid to come learn how to practice it and be a part of the close-knit, sometimes competitive circle that basked in his aura, sat at his knee.
Category: Special Column
Valley Sentinel lends platform in print and online to foster community ideas
We are pleased to announce the (soft) launch of Valley Sentinel’s Impulse Initiative. It has always been our goal to build community and over the past year plus we’ve been talking to area residents every day about their wants, hopes and dreams for the community. We’ve asked many times in print what ideas you had for the community and how we go about doing them. This initiative is a culmination of those things.
Discovering yourself in any space can pose challenges for someone. Whether it be your career choice or becoming the person you were born to be, figuring yourself out is a long journey. This is also a journey that never ends. Don’t expect to wake up one day, and suddenly be your completed self. You should be growing and changing every single day.
If you follow Valley Sentinel on social media, over the last few weeks you’ve seen that we have been struggling with inconsistencies and missteps with the printing company that prints the paper each week.
It’s hard to believe that Valley Sentinel has been publishing since October— that’s nearly six months. I say that it’s hard to believe because for me the weeks have flown by and I feel like we have come so far in this endeavor.
As covered in the March 11 River Valley School Board story, board member Sara Young proposed an ‘Equity and Understanding Work Group’, composed of teachers, administrators, a community representative and a parent, who would be charged with admirable equity, diversity and inclusion tasks, including proposing district policy.
To think that we have lived with COVID-19 impacting our lives for over a year now still hasn’t hit me. I’m sure most of us have seen the internet memes about how we’re still processing last March while this March has already started, but for me, it’s kind of true.
For the past month we’ve asked the community to share with us some ideas they have to better the community. We asked to figure out the services/offerings/events, etc. that an area would need to have to want to settle down there. We asked what some things are that every community should offer its residents? Not just now during COVID, but in normal times too. What things represent that concept of community? Some things you’d wish your hometown had?
We wanted to take this opportunity, in our inaugural issue, to conversationally introduce Valley Sentinel to its readers and to our community. It’s been a busy couple of months, and an even busier couple of weeks. The sheer amount of outpouring support and interest from our community has been both welcome and overwhelming.