I Dig It!

This is the best video I've seen on school gardening (and it's from Rochester Roots in Rochester, NY, a much, much colder climate than ours--I know, because I went to college just 30 minutes away from there).

Love it, love it, love it. Take the 7 minutes or so and watch with your kids. Ask if they'd like to participate in even just a smidgen of this in Dunwoody. There are currently no school food gardens in Dunwoody, except for a small bed or two here or there. (School gardens are required at every public school in California.)

But I have an idea . . .

This Is Our Year, Fellow Citizens of Dunwoody

I was going to give you this picture today, a snippet of the extensive construction going on all around the mall, this one taken on the road that goes to our new City Hall. That's because I want to talk a bit about the community involvement process of the Comprehensive Plan, and this photo says development, zoning, mixed use, density, overcrowded schools and all those growth buzz words that tend to get folks fired up. Yes, all these things will be discussed as part of the community involvement process, I'm guessing.

But I'm going to give you this photo instead. That's because this photo reminds me that our challenge is not only to suggest parameters for building buildings. It is to propose fresh, new ideas for building community.



You see, my teenager attended Dekalb School of the Arts this past year, on North Druid Hills Road. On the occasions that I drove there for some reason, I always took the side roads (I don't just make slow meals; I travel slowly, too!) and I passed this sand volleyball court (there are actually two of them) after making a left from Peachtree Industrial Road onto North Druid Hills Road.

Here's the thing. The courts were always, always being used, by what appeared to be teenagers to me. And this got me thinking. Where do our teenagers go? Where do they go? Yes, I know the churches try to plan programs to engage them. And of course there is the mall. But, in general, do you ever see teenagers out there? It's as if they don't exist in our community. I overhead some of my daughter's friends talking about where they were going to live when they grow up. No one even imagined the possibility of living in a place anything like Dunwoody. There's nothing for them to do.

And so, when I think about the comprehensive plan, I think about this group that will be of the home-buying age in the next fifteen to twenty years. I think about what it will take to make our community vibrant, attractive, and yes, sustainable to the younger generations in the face of global change and opportunity elsewhere. I think about the fact that I will be twenty years older as well (we sometimes forget that, don't we?!) and if this community will have what I need to live a full life at that time. I'd like to think I'd still be riding my bike, walking places, having time to linger at local cafes with friends and lending what will surely be by then some semblance of expertise to community and school gardens. But none of that will exist in any real way unless it is accounted for in this Comprehensive Plan.

This is our year, fellow citizens of Dunwoody. This is our year to be heard, and to make a difference in a way that may never be seen again. This is the time to get involved whether or not you've ever been involved before. This is the time to simply show up, and share your input, insight and ideas, even if you don't have a fingernail's worth of zoning experience (yeah, that would be me, although the recent farmers market discussions may get me up to fingernail status now). There will be days, a year from now and twenty years from now, when you will be glad that you did. There will be a day when you are walking or biking or driving around our city and you will see something and say, "I helped make that happen." And you will tell your children and grandchildren that. And it will matter.

One more reason to show up? The consultants hired to take our city through this process have different "themes, exercises, and information" planned for each of the community involvement sessions. Doesn't that at least get you curious?!

Here's hoping to see you at 7 PM at Dunwoody United Methodist Church on Mt. Vernon Road (by Dunkin' Donuts) on June 2, June 23, July 7, August 3 and September 24. At least come to one of them.

And here's hoping to see you around town, imagining, envisioning, and ultimately making your mark a little bit more each and every day. To make a volleyball reference, the ball is in our hands. It's our serve.

"Summer Projects"

Do you recognize the man on the left? His name is Don Converse and I recognize him because he in on the City of Dunwoody Zoning and Planning Commission. The farmers market issue came up before that group back in April. Don then attended our Sustainability Commission meeting, and then made a comment in support of our board at a City Council meeting. I had left before he spoke and listened to his comment on the audio that John always posts on his blog.

Don said that although we were bigger "tree huggers" than his taste, he thought we were doing a great job. The comment made me laugh because if you knew our group, you would never call us tree huggers, if being called tree huggers is considered a derogatory comment. We're moms and dads and business owners and community volunteers. I have yet to see any of us hug a tree (although, perhaps Claire might since she's the executive director of the Dunwoody Nature Center and she is surrounded by them all day!) Don himself, in fact, emailed me the next to say he didn't mean the comment to be negative. He then told me that he, in fact, was heading out on a five-week hike on the Appalachian Trail!

I have been getting updates of Don's hike from his wife, Karen. Here is a picture of the hiking group from a hike they took together last fall, plus brief descriptions of each person, according to Karen:

Don: retired scalawag from Georgia

Lorraine: from near Clearwater, FL

Tom: the organizer, retired salesman from Columbus, Ohio

Carol: retired nurse, from N. Carolina

Dale: retired Superintendent of Schools, from Kentucky

An additional member this year, not in this pictures, is Jesse, Vietman vet, gregarious retired Postal worker and a gardener, from Alabama.

Don plans to hike from Daleville, Virginia to Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. While I was mowing my lawn yesterday and thinking how much more challenging the push reel mower seems this year than last, here is what Don did:

Today was a 13 mile day and the trail was rocky again, creating some pressure on Don's blister from rolling around on the rocks. After awhile, he decided to do some "road walking" on the Blueridge Parkway instead of the trail, to take some of the pressure off. Unfortunately, about that time there was a 2-hour downpour so his shoes got pretty wet and of course that didn't help matters. By the time he arrived at Rock Mountain Shelter, the tape had slipped off and it was not pretty! Hopefully, his shoes will dry out overnight. Don has decided to sleep in the 1941-era shelter tonight because there's not much level ground nor convenient trees to hang his hammock on.

A nice surprise happened around lunchtime at a road crossing, another incidence of "trail magic". A group of about 5 people had set up their grill and were cooking cheeseburgers for the hikers who were passing through. They were also handing out baby carrots, nectarines, bananas, and softdrinks. Apparently the group performs this service every Memorial Day, a much appreciated treat!

Tomorrow's hike will be only about 7 miles to the Loft Mtn Campground where there are showers and a store that sells hamburgers and milkshakes! Don's looking forward to that!

I like thinking about Don out there because I've never been on the Appalachian Trail, although my older daughter spent three tentless nights on it last year and my neighbor spent five months hiking the entire length of it from Georgia to Maine a few years ago. I like thinking about it because I was surprised to find this out about him, and that reminds me how important it is to get to know people, especially because having a sense of community connection is a large component of sustainability. I like to think about Don and his group out there also because it challenges me to come up with my own "summer projects."

This summer, in addition to my work (editorial and corporate writing deadlines), civic volunteering (Sustainability Commission and the Comprehensive Plan Steering Committee), family, and garden, I am:

* Learning how to cook with a solar cooker (here's why)
* Mowing that darn lawn
* Working on a new book proposal
* Reading a pile of books in the hammock, as usual! (Here are more.)
* Learning how to make natural dyes

What's your summer project? And what do you want to bet that Don might hug a tree or two in his travels?!

"A Little Bird Told Me"

My mother knew everything that was happening in our town growing up (especially where I was, who I was with and what I did!) When asked, she'd just say, "A little bird told me."

Well, I've been thinking about this and yes, of course, the "little birds" on the Dunwoody grapevine are alive and well, but one of the things that is increasingly concerning me is the availability of accurate, up-to-date news reporting in our City. We have one media outlet in our city of 42,000 people, the Crier. I like the Crier. I read the Crier. But not until I started attending City Council meetings and other politically-charged things around Dunwoody did I realize how very slanted the paper is. No surprise there; journalism by its very nature requires a point of view, even when the reporter attempts to be as objective as possible. The mere coverage of one story over another represents an opinion.

The problem? The lack of other voices and viewpoints. Okay, here is the moment when we can all say collectively, "Thank goodness for John." John Heneghan is doing a bang-up job on his sometimes more-than-daily blog updates, but when it took until Monday for me to hear that a Dunwoody child was severely hurt when hit by a person driving a car last Friday, and then I couldn't find any details at all anywhere because John was out of town, that's a sign that we have holes in our communication methods here in Dunwoody. (And, by the way, I found this out when I was at an extraordinarily positive clean-up of the new farmers market location by the post office that involved City Council members, citizens and a board member/artisan from the Dunwoody Farmers Market. The Crier headline this week, Doing the Farmers Work, had, to me, a negative, divisive slant that was not at all representative of the reality I witnessed).

And so, here is what I am personally trying to do. I'm tweeting on Twitter (updates are posted in the sidebar of this blog--if you are getting this blog via email, tap in to the actual blog as often as you want since I'm continually adding and changing things). I'm still figuring out how best to use this tool, but I like how John links to his blog posts (I'm doing this on Facebook), and I like how Farmer D gives quick updates on the sustainability actions he is taking. (Here is his latest: Interviewed with the City of Suwanee about setting up an urban organic farm & community garden. Very cool project. I hope we get it.)

I am also asking, begging, more voices to come to the forefront. The AJC is laying off reporters left and right. Our own Crier has revealed itself to be limited. Even Thaddeus Osbourned Dabell has stopped peppering our community with thought-provoking alternative ways of seeing what's happening. As far as I can see, we have five voices (in addition to those at the Crier) publishing with some semblance of regularity here in Dunwoody: John, me, Donna Nall, Bob Fiscella, and the strangely anonymous Dunwoody Police Watch person or people. The citizen account of this week's City Council meeting, posted on John's blog (of course!), is a fresh, opinionated first-person account from a different perspective. We need MORE of this. We need YOU!

If you have an interest in citizen reporting, please consider:

1. Starting a blog. It is easy and free (and only 10 bucks if you get a custom domain name, without the "blogger" in the URL). Go to www.blogger.com. Sign in and click "Create a blog."

2. Joining Twitter and giving updates relating to our city as often as you can stand to do so. Once every day or two works for me, but Farmer D updates several times a day, especially when he builds another garden (he seems to be putting in a community, school, city or personal vegetable garden every single day of the week).

3. Reading and posting on the City of Dunwoody website's Community Discussion Board.

4. Getting in on the action at our social networking site.

5. Finding out how Radio Sandy Springs is doing what they are doing and considering spearheading the formation of a radio or television station for Dunwoody.

6. Proposing new ideas and trying new things. Technology offers lots of tools we can use to connect and share information.

The more voices we have, the more chances we have of hearing and evaluating different points of view and finding the collective truths that can make a difference in helping our city take positive, sustainable steps forward.

Put Yourself to the Test

Although this video is ultimately promoting something near and dear to my heart, I think the message can be applied to many parts of life.

* A Peachtree Middle School boy who lives in Dunwoody apparently got hit getting off (or after getting off) the bus last Thursday. (I have yet to find an official account of this.)

* According to the Community Assessment document, about 2,000 Dunwoody residents live below the poverty line.

* And a box turtle lay dying in my street as car after car and walker after walker passed it without doing anything to help it (until my friend Richard moved it to where it could die with dignity).

Someone walked by while we were cleaning up the post office site for the farmers market yesterday and said, "I've been walking my dog through here for years and I wondered when they were going to clean it up." I told the man, "There is no they, you know. There is only we."

It is time for me to notice things more. It is time for me to do something to make a bigger difference. There is no they. There is only you and me. And what we choose to notice--and act on--matters.

Necessity Is the Mother of Invention

Got my new issue of Fast Company magazine yesterday (I'm down to just a few subscriptions but this publication is consistently one of my favorites) and the cover story is on The 100 Most Creative People in Business. I've barely begun reading it but I got to thinking about creativity (yet again) and how the future belongs to the innovators. Ya' want to give your community a boost of energy, do something new. Try something different. Expand minds. Think outside the box.

Here are two little examples of businesses I've seen in Dunwoody recently that caused me to do a double-take. One, Big Daddy Biscuits, whose 25-cent biscuit machine wins my totally unofficial award for "favorite thing in the world" for this week. Big Daddy Biscuits was started by a woman named Lauren and is named after her rescue dog named, yes, Big Daddy. Lauren lost her job and her dad died at about the same time and she found herself there with the dog, feeling lost, wondering what to do. And as most stories go, an idea was born, and now these all-natural and organic dog treats can be found not only around Atlanta but in the shopping baskets of celebs like Sly Stallone at a dog store in Los Angeles. (You can find them here in Dunwoody at the farmers market, wherever that happens to be located at the time you read this!).

The other example completely perplexed me. I was at the Kroger parking lot and there this car was. Advertising a businesses named My Sock Service. For sock subscriptions? Hmmm. What on earth . . . Sure enough, it turns out that apparently men are having trouble "completing their outfits" and basically hate their socks. They can now order U.S. made cotton calf and crew socks, cotton knee socks, merino wool socks, cashmere silk socks, and golf socks, delivered to their homes right here in Dunwoody.



And you thought there was a recession going on? Perhaps that's when new ideas flourish. You know the ole saying: Necessity is the mother of invention. Are dog biscuits and socks going to make our city more sustainable? Maybe not, but thinking about everyday things in a new way just might.

Heads Up (and Helmet On!)

Heads up and helmet on! It's Bike to Work Week, and that means you may see more cyclists on the streets this week, including those who are brand new to it.

If you are in a car trying to pass them:

* Give them at least three feet.

* Please learn hand signals so you recognize when they are trying to tell you they are making a left or right.

* Realize they are expected to follow the same rules of the road as automobile drivers (that means stopping at stop signs and red lights, for instance), and they have the right to "take the lane" when they make left hand turns and whenever they feel they need to do so to be safe.

Most importantly, please know that is hard out there and they are fighting a car culture, uphills, lack of designated space for cycling, and most likely a work environment that does not provide adequate or safe bicycle parking or showers for freshening up. They are literally blazing a path for our city, showing us a little glimpse of what is possible if we were to truly become a bikable, walkable community.

Find out more about Bike to Work Week here.

Wanna give it a shot but don't feel quite confident yet out there on the streets? Take it easy somewhere close to home, and consider signing up for the Confident Cycling Class on May 30 right here in Dunwoody, hosted by the Perimeter Transportation Coalition and REI. It costs ten bucks if you live or work in the Perimeter Area (or if you recently lost your job).

Also, with this wonderful police force we have, let's give some thought to "safety on the roads" education, starting with our children. Some municipalities include these lessons each year as part of health or P.E. Here's a FoodShed Planet post about what the police did with schoolchildren where I grew up.

And whether you put pedal power to work or just observe the "men and women in lycra," shout it out about your Bike to Work experience on our social networking site!

Don't want to ride, or don't go to a separate workplace? Join Kingsley in its final formal Walk to School Day Wednesday and fill our city's sidewalks with children as pedestrians.

Dunwoody Food Gardeners #1: Meet Van Malone

Whether or not Dunwoody keeps its farmers market, here's something that grew this year that can't be lost--connections. The same group of people have been trotting into meetings since February to represent a wide range of reasons in support of our farmers market, and farmers markets in general. As a result, we're starting to put names and faces together, and a sense of community has been growing even stronger.

I was driving to the Dunwoody library to get this week's issue of the Crier on Tuesday (mine doesn't come sometimes until Saturday!) when I saw a man I had met at one of the meetings digging away in his front yard vegetable garden, full heads of lettuce at his feet, peas hanging heavy on the trellises. I pulled over and waved my arms in greeting.

Meet Van Malone. Van and Sally live on a corner on Womack and have been growing a front-yard vegetable garden for about five years. Although Van grew up on a small farm in northern Alabama, he hadn't gardened much until after being diagnosed with colorectal cancer. Now a six-year survivor, Van says, when asked how much time he spends gardening, "You don't keep up with time when you're gardening, because it's fun."

Van and Sally grow vegetables all year, using a cold frame for the winter and for starting vegetables from seeds they get from the South Carolina Seed Foundation at Clemson University. In addition to vegetables, they have blueberry, fig and pear trees. Plus, Sally grinds her own wheat and bakes bread each week, and makes cheese, butter and kefir from raw milk.

Van's Gardening Advice


* The most important thing you can do is add mulch so that you get worms.

* You don't need to till after the first year.

* Treat it like a science project.

Van says that since they started gardening, they have met many neighbors and passers-by whom they didn't know before. He said that several of his neighbors have invited him to pick fruit from their trees, and a man down ther street chops up his leaves every fall for Van to use as mulch. On Halloween, a group of children stood at his front door and said, "We don't know who you are but we love your garden!"

Well, now you know. He's Van Malone. Say hi when you see him out there. And let me know if you have (or know of) a vegetable garden you'd like to see featured on Sustainable Dunwoody. I'd like to get to know who grows food here in our City. Although the Secret Gardens of Dunwoody Tour sounds very nice next weekend (I have enjoyed it in the past), and it benefits the wonderful Dunwoody Nature Center, I see only one mention of edibles in the garden descriptions--at Katherine Feemans' house.

The creation and care of home gardens serve as a critical component of local food security (40% of all Americans had home veggie gardens during the World Wars--statistics indicate that 37% of all Americans intend to grow food this year).
Besides, it's one sure way to get a legal, local tomato!

This Train Has Left the Station

Atlanta goes green. Dunwoody goes green. The school system goes green. Your place of business is most likely going green. And now Dekalb County goes green with the announcement of the establishment of its very own Green Commission and a kick-off event planned for this Saturday, May 9 from 9:30 am to 12:00 at the Porter Sanford III Performing Arts Center, the County’s newest building (in Decatur) that was built to LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) standards.

This train has left the station. The only question remaining is are you on board? If not, here is a sampling of simple ways to get up to speed and join this worldwide revolution that has finally, finally permeated our region:

* Planet Green (my teenager is in love with several of the shows on this Discovery-owned network)

* Sustainlane (I like this site specifically for best practices examples from other cities)

* MNN (this is a relatively new site that is doing a bang-up job)

* ENN (a great constantly-updated environmental news site)

* Kudzu's Green Guide (quick, helpful tips, and gosh, do you recognize the writing style?!)

* Dunwoody Sustainability Brochure (everything that Debbie Smith designs just looks so inviting to me. Well, guess what? You're invited into this conversation!)

* New Life Journal (I have a monthly column in there. Plus, this publication does a particularly great job with green building information and other sustainability topics. And the editor-in-chief, Maggie Cramer, could not be nicer.)

* Southface (Don't miss the monthly Sustainable Atlanta Roundtable meeting. It's the best in town.)

* Southeast Green (a growing resource about what green things are happening in our region)

* Dunwoody Sustainability social networking site (this thing is growing daily and people who didn't know each other previously are connecting from all around Dunwoody--get involved!)