Starting local with a flicker of light

There's good stuff for us to do

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I’m not the only Substacker or, more generally, dispenser of viewpoints on culture, economics and the world stage, who is increasingly at pains to have a substantive response to the current lay of the land.

We all know that, simultaneously, Donald Trump and those he has working on the Ukraine situation, by all appearances, seem to be taking their cue straight from Russian talking points, even as Germany is building anti-tank barriers and digging trenches on Poland’s border with Belarus and Russia, because, according to chancellor Friedrich Merz, “The decades of the Pax Americana are largely over for us in Europe and Germany. It no longer exists as we knew it.” We see, from the mass shooting on an Australian beach that the jihadist threat is not defeated or even really dormant. The US labor market “ground to a halt” in 2025. The Trump administration has had to implement the absurd move of offering cash relief to farmers affected by the tariffs he imposed on their overseas customers. There is the grotesque Truth Social response the Very Stable Genius had to Rob Reiner’s murder, which follows on the heels of the sh— video, “Quiet, piggy,” all the grift, and the White House ballroom.

As my therapist says when I bring it up, “It’s a dumpster fire.”

So I am revisiting the question of how one starts where one is to be an agent of positivity.

I have harbored a bit of skepticism over the years about immersing oneself in the local. Yes, that’s where civic bonds can be shored up, celebrations more easily staged, faith more welcomed in public life, children brought into the proceedings, But small communities that are hometowns to generations, and where all know each other, can become quite insular and operate according to hierarchies of their own. Country club. vs. corner bar and such.

I’ve explicitly written about this a couple of times in posts titled “Place” and “More Thoughts on Place”. They’re fairly deep dives into the various considerations concerning staying put or doing a lot of moving. I encourage you to revisit them.

But here I am, in a small city where I’ve lived most of my life. There are a lot of pros and cons to dwelling here. We actually have a pretty good dining scene (which I cover in the Taste section of each issue of our city magazine). Two symphony orchestras. A mandolin orchestra! (In which I play guitar, and for which I had to learn how to read classical charts.) A dedicated community theater group. Our economic picture is somewhat lopsided. A locally headquartered Fortune 200 multinational corporation is the eight-zillion-pound gorilla in the economic room, and economic-development efforts mainly focus on bringing new manufacturing concerns to our industrial parks. The weather gives us a taste of the best of each season, and there are nearby scenic getaway destinations.

But here I am.

And at age 70, what is there for me to do to in this environment?

Well, I already mentioned some musical activity. I also had had a hankering to play some honest-to-goodness jazz - standards, bop and hard bop charts, blues and modal excursions. Like a lot of musicians, I’ve had to slog it out in rooms full of geriatric toe-tappers who were on hand to hear covers of pop tunes from the 1970s, and was longing to get back to something worth sinking my teeth into. And I now have that, in a duo with a bass player. We play the first Friday of every month at a cafe, and we’re starting to pick up some other gigs. And we’re filling the room! (Even spotted the mayor at one gig.) There’s an audience right here for what I really like to do.

My wife and I like to entertain. We had a mid-December clipper blast through over the weekend - several inches of snow and plummeting temperatures - so Sunday morning, I put a lovingly prepared roast in the oven. Then I got to thinking about a neighbor lady who’s among the folks in our condo neighborhood we know somewhat. We know she doesn’t have a lot of local social connections, so I invited her to join us when the roast was done. We had a great evening - excellent food (she brought a great sweet potato casserole) - and conversation.

My church, which I’ve written about here a few times, is what most folks of faith are looking for - a doctrinally sound place, a congregation that exemplifies “thick community,” lots of opportunities to volunteer for activities that bless our city, and intelligent, faith-based conversations laced with lots of laughter.

There are signs that Substackers of my general orientation are increasingly looking at what can be done where one’s feet are planted.

Aaron Renn frequently touts his city - Carmel, Indiana, the biggest of Indianapolis’s suburbs - as a model for how to get balance, proportion, economic flourishing and cultural vitality right.

Andrew Donaldson writes frequently about Washington machinations and national economics, and has some impressive guests on his Heard Tell podcast, but seems to have a special affinity for the radio stations and print outlets of his native West Virginia. I know him from Twitter (X, if you must). In fact, he’s the one who invited me to become a contributor to Ordinary Times. He shares my enthusiasm for cooking (and eating) and shows off some pretty nice work in that regard. Lately, he’s enrolled in the culinary-arts program at his local community college, and is winding up his first semester. He proudly showed off the results of his finals-lab efforts on Twitter, as well as a group photo with his classmates that made evident the camaraderie they’d developed.

It can be done. It doesn’t mean the larger-scope picture isn’t grim as hell.

But the light hasn’t gone out, because here you are. Here I am. And the day is stretched out before us, full of possibility.