“Sitting and being present with someone, and asking them important questions is something that doesn’t happen that often during the course of day-to-day life, and is one of the most profound and powerful ways we have to tell someone else how much we love them.” ~David Isay, Founder of StoryCorps, recipient of the MacArthur “Genius” Award
As spring turned to summer, we embarked on a journey around Boulder County to listen and learn from you. We wanted to know how you are feeling about your community, what issues are most important to you, and what you would do to make a difference in these issues.
We listened together in a church in Longmont, a recreation center in Louisville, a library in Nederland, a community music school in Lafayette, and in downtown Boulder too. We’re just about halfway through a journey of nearly fifty conversations throughout our county.
The cycle of listening, learning, and acting is a continual process. Along the way, we have been compelled to stop and name what we are experiencing and to thank each of you who has taken the time to attend a session.
Just this week a woman attending one of the listening sessions described herself as a career educator. She and her husband, both in their sixties, are having trouble making ends meet on their Social Security benefits and current hourly-wage jobs. Their rent continued to rise until they could no longer afford to pay it. They now live in their car and eat out of a cooler. They found someone to take care of their aging cat because they feared it would not survive summer in the car.
“I never thought these would be the most chaotic years of our lives,” she said. “We are the baby boomers. We worked and paid our taxes. We shouldn’t be kicked to the gutter.”
Mary Oliver wrote:
“Here is a story
to break your heart.
Are you willing?
… to break your heart,
by which I mean only
that it break open and never close again
to the rest of the world.”
During these conversations, people are risking the expression of their personal lives, listening deeply to each other, and seeking not only to be understood but to understand. And, together, we’re learning that listening itself can be an act of compassion and respect.
As summer turns to fall, we will summarize and report what you told us. Also around that time, we will publish a new edition of TRENDS, your Community Foundation’s report on community indicators, and a corresponding website. As we learn from the listening tour and the data lifted up by TRENDS, we will move with you from inquiry to action and from questions of “What?” and “Why?” to responses of “What if?” and “How might we?”
If you’d like to participate in a listening session, please see the schedule. We’ll look forward to seeing you.
Yours in community,
Jeff
