JOURNAL
The Art & Joy of a Community
Bill Barksdale, Columnist
Joe & I came upon a short documentary the other night on YouTube about a German man who became fascinated by the old rural architecture of Japanese country houses. After years of rescuing these architectural gems, largely abandon by the booming Japanese culture as it “industrializes”, he and his wife bought a small piece of land & its derelict old house in a remote village. He lovingly restored this historic house that was on the brink of being lost. It’s now a remarkably beautiful home, a work of art truly.
His passion for the art & craft of these old houses, some of them from the Edo period of Japan – a time of peace and art, has revived this village that was nearly abandon. People, all Japanese except for this now elderly German couple, have come together as a mutually supportive, joyful small community to live in their mountainous village reviving derelict rice fields, creating beautiful gardens, raising food, enjoying & each other’s company, raising happy children where older people fill in as surrogate grandparents for the young children now being born to the young people who are choosing this simpler rural life to raise their families.
All of this made me think of our own town of Willits. I’ve loved Willits since we first moved here in the 80’s. We too, lived a rural life here in a remote cabin in the forest with kerosene lamps, an outhouse, no phone at first, just cold water and a garden were we followed the instructions of John Jeavon’s book, How to Grow More Vegetables. We revived an abandon garden. That first crop of broccoli, Romaine lettuce, onions & garlic – was so abundant that we literally hauled boxes of our abundant harvest to town and gave our produce away on the streets of town.
Now, years later, I’ve retired from a 30-year very active career and we live in town. We’ve restored or remodeled four houses, passing two of them along to others. I have a feeling of belonging in my adopted town after all these years. I had the city-life of New York & San Francisco as a young man, but at this stage of my life, like the old German, I’ve come to treasure this small town with its slower pace and feeling of community.
We have our own appreciator of the old houses in Willits. Steve Marston has restored several beautiful old Craftsman houses on Commercial St. One, in particular, was in danger of being torn down because it had been so neglected. Now, thanks to Steve, it has been restored to its original pristine beauty – an emblematic example of this beloved architectural style. Steve’s affection for this style and his own craftsmanship has given our community the gift of new life for nearly lost homes that are gems of their kind.
I struggle with my own 60’s vintage house, to discover what possibilities its uninteresting styling can reveal. A house transforms once it becomes a home. When it is loved as a place to nurture the ones who live there, is cared about – it begins to reveal hidden possibilities. Tom & Sara Mann have also restored a once dilapidated Craftsman to its former beauty. I watched as Matt & Tara Moratti carefully renovated their simple cottage in town, lifting it from its deteriorating foundation in the mud and lovingly restoring it to a simple yet elegant home for their family.
The town of Willits is a kind of wonderful mix of different kinds of people. It extends far beyond the city-limits and is the “town” for thousands of people in rural subdivisions, ranches & farms, individual homes in the unincorporated areas of Mendocino County that surround the town. This expanded population has given the town the resources and community to create one of the newest hospitals in the country, a beautiful new fire station, a vibrant arts community.
Yes, our community still has work to do, like all towns, cities, villages. There are schools to improve. There’s poverty, and substance abuse and mental health issues, people struggling to just live day-to-day. There’s the unfolding effort to understand how to figure out the cannabis business – like it or not – that is a part of this community. Our lush forests once provided many jobs here, before giant corporations primarily headquartered in Southern states, invaded our region with a “cut-and-run” profit motive that has left hard feelings and lost jobs that still linger, still hurt.
These, and other issues, need solutions. I feel hope as I see people stepping up to discover ways to solve our challenges. Big cities have their own concerns as they deal with their ever expanding populations of more people occupying finite space & resources. Our own small town has limited resources such as infrastructure, sewer, water, money to pay for what’s needed. And just as important, discovering what’s not necessarily needed. As new technologies evolve that help us escape from the strangle-hold of fossil fuels and that industry’s often toxic cousin – plastic.
All of humanity has the huge concern of how to deal with things like over population, the urgent problem of waste. We can’t survive as a part of the ecosystem of this planet if we continue on the dead-end path of “the disposable society”. We must prioritize clean air and water. We must take on authoritarian government that robs the financial resources of the many and deposits them into the bank accounts of the very few. We are a county and really a planet, at a point of needed global change. Oddly, the solutions are small - the behavior of each individual. The choices we each make combine to create big change. Don’t buy the product packaged in plastic or take the plastic bag. Make your next vehicle more fuel efficient. Take a shorter shower. Support your local farmers. Be more generous to the local food bank. Recycle & reuse. Use waxpaper. See real mental health as a priority. Pay attention to who you vote for – are they really looking out for you or just lying to you to get reelected? It’s each decision you make that creates solutions.
Community, from the Latin word communitas - common. The responsibility, and the profound impact, of working together, making good choices, so we can all live better and sustain the very planet i.e. environment we depend on to have life itself. Community. The simple act of taking care of your home.
