Knapsack 11-15

Notes from my Knapsack – Granville Sentinel 11-15-12

Jeff Gill

 

Looking beyond this election, or any

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I'm writing this before Election Day is over, without knowing the results of anything from coroners to constitutional conventions.

 

By the time it runs in the paper, we may still not know how all of these candidates and ballot issues have shaken out. Some votes will be decisive, and others may offer a more ambiguous message. Some decisions by "we, the people" may not necessarily mean what a quick glance over the polling results might indicate.

 

On the much-debated community pool issue, I strongly suspect, for a wide variety of reasons, that it will fail. I could be wrong, but I doubt it.

 

Here's what I'd really like to say to everyone who worked so hard, with the very best of intentions and hopes for our village: thank you. What I think this vote does is begin a conversation, not closing a chapter. We've lost Spring Valley, and we're seeing competitive swimming grow, and there's clearly a need for a pool, ideally another year-round pool, that the public can use.

 

It's hard not to drive back and forth out Pearl St. to the intermediate, middle, and high school buildings, and not look longingly at the vast new building housing a natatorium for Denison University. Are there ways to add capacity and create partnerships to get the community inside that building without interfering with Denison's core mission to their students? I don't know.

 

Driving on past, as a non-swimmer myself, I think that what we really need, and are now discussing, is a community push for fitness in general, physical activity in particular, and space for a variety of healthy activities. Rolling in and out of the parking lots of the schools on Burg and New Burg Streets, I wonder: is there a community center plan that can bring together the Granville Schools and the Recreation District to each others' mutual benefit? And would a year-round community center, on land (let's say) between Burg & Loudon be a first step, designed where an outdoor pool could be added when the time & economics are right? I truly don't know, but I'm delighted that we're all talking about health & fitness & everyday sorts of exercise.

 

And then there's the presidential election. I believe it very likely that we won't have a definite Ohio winner, hence no confirmed candidate nationally, by the time you read this. I hope I'm wrong! Regardless, here's what I ask of the winner: please go talk to the other party, and don't let the first rebuff be the end of your attempts. My sincere personal concern is that we've spent much of the last twelve years dog-paddling in the river, as the current is carrying us towards a waterfall. As the roaring gets louder, the left arm and the right arm are blaming each other for not swimming more strongly for shore.

 

Right and left, you need two arms to swim. They have to work together, if only because when you go over the cataract, you'll both hit bottom about the same time. Even with upper income and even middle income tax increases (which I'm sure are coming whomever wins), we can't continue spending at this rate, and it's time to focus on getting to solid ground, which will take co-ordinated effort to achieve.

 

Come to think of it, I learned how to do that in a pool.

 

Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and pastor; tell him what you learned from your swimming lessons at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on Twitter.