community
This Place We Call Home
By Scott Laird
Over the years many people
have tried to describe “home.”
“Home is where the heart is.”
“Home is whatever place you
long to be.”
Or, as the Talking Heads stated
it in their lovely song, This Must Be the
Place, “Home - is where I want to be,
but I guess I’m already there.”
What we consider our home has
many definitions and descriptions. It
can be the physical structure we reside
in, the town where we live, the place we
originally come from, where our family
lives, or even the region of the country
where we find ourselves.
We often think of home as a
place, designated by man-made bound-
aries—a street address or a town, state
or country on a map. Bio regionalists
like to consider a place, not by those
man-made divisions, but by the eco-
logical borders that make a place unique
-using rivers, mountains and basins to
designate the confines of a place.
In Vernonia, we find ourselves
surrounded by those forests, rivers and
streams, and hills and valleys—certainly
a very beautiful place to call home.
Home can also be an idea. One
of my favorite definitions of home is, “a
place where something flourishes.”
Another way to think about
home is to consider the people and com-
munity that make up a place and make it
special.
As we celebrate the holiday
season and the end of the year, let’s take
a moment to look back at our community
and the people that make this place our
home:
• This is place where people can put
aside political and religious differences
and find ways to work together.
• This is a place where, when the com-
munity was devastated by a flood in
2007 the people came together to focus
on the recovery effort, which is just now
reaching its final stages, seven years
later.
• This is a place that chose to tax them-
selves in the middle of an economic
downturn to raise $13 million to build
a new school campus for the children of
the community.
•This is a place where those children
often can’t wait to leave to go out and
explore the rest of the world, (as they
should) but often choose to come back
when it’s time to raise their own fami-
lies.
• This is a place where the committee
that plans an almost sixty-year tradi-
tion, the annual Jamboree and Logging
Show, experienced a resurgence and
a new burst of energy and enthusiasm
this past year from a somewhat unlikely
source—a group of twenty-something
young mothers, who are choosing to
raise their families here.
• This is a place where another of the
main planners of several recent events,
including Jamboree, doesn’t even live
here, but still considers this her “home.”
• This is a place where, when a local
family, somewhat new to the communi-
ty, lost everything to a fire, the commu-
nity rallied to donate household items
for them. The community then held a
sale with the left over donated items
the family couldn’t use, raising funds to
help the family get back on their feet,
even though they decided they needed
to move away from Vernonia to restart
their lives.
• This is a place where workers at the
electric cooperative work non-stop,
though rain and flooding, through big
winter snow storms, and, as we saw last
week, through the windiest of weather,
to restore power to all of us.
• This is a place where community men-
tors donate their time to help local high
school seniors explore career options
through their Senior Projects.
• This is a place where a group, known
for tooling around in beefed up four-
wheel drive pick-up trucks and SUVs,
are becoming even better known as a
service organization with a generous
community spirit and an extremely giv-
ing nature.
• This is a place where the local school
district, battling a tight budget, depends
on and receives hours of classroom and
other help from community volunteers.
• This is a place where local volunteers
stage an old-fashioned, small town
Christmas celebration, complete with
storytelling, cookie baking, gingerbread
house decorating, home and storefront
decorating and chili cook-off
december18
2014
competitions, and ends with a lighted
parade—led by those community
minded four-wheel enthusiasts.
• This is a place where over 200 fami-
lies will receive a Christmas meal from
the local food bank, complete with tur-
key and all the trimmings. Much of the
funds and food for those meals are do-
nated by local citizens, businesses and
community groups.
• This is a place where local firefighters
will deliver donated toys for Christmas
to over 200 local children.
• This is a place where an elderly
gentleman and his family choose to
spend their Christmas day hosting an
annual dinner on December 25 for
anyone who needs a place to spend the
holiday, and won’t accept any donations
or gratuities for their effort.
• This is a place where, when a local
and much beloved man passes away too
early, the funeral is held in the largest
space available, the local school, and
there still isn’t room for everyone.
Our wish for you this holiday
season is that you take a moment to slow
down and truly appreciate this place we
all call home.
3
Publisher and Managing Editor
Scott Laird
503-367-0098
scott@vernoniasvoice.com
Contributors
Chip Bubl
Tobie Finzel
Karen Kain
Dr. Carol McIntyre
Aaron Miller
Karen Miller
Grant Williams
Photography
Karen Kain
Scott Laird
Want to advertise?
Have an article?
Contact: scott@vernoniasvoice.com
One year subscriptions
(24 issues) $35
Vernonia’s Voice is published
on the 1st and 3rd Thursday
of each month.
Vernonia’s Voice, LLC
PO Box 55
Vernonia, OR 97064
503-367-0098
www.VernoniasVoice.com
Season’s Greetings
from your friends at
Wauna Credit Union
WOEC
HOLIDAY HOURS
Christmas Eve 8 am-Noon
Christmas Day Closed
New Year’s Eve 8-10 am
New Year’s Day Closed
Merry Christmas
Barbara, Brian, Cassandra, Kinnell, Pam, & Sue
800-773-3236
waunafcu.org
1010 Bridge St. Vernonia
Wishing you a Merry Christmas
from
All of Us
at
West Oregon Electric Co-op
from the Vernonia Dental Team
622 Bridge Street
