Community

There is a Mexican proverb than in essence says that a house is not built upon the ground but rather upon the woman at its heart.

We are women, we are mother, daughters, sisters, we are the givers of life.

Without us, a house is just a house. We are the heart that beats within, we are the soul that brings a place to life and enables it to grow into a home.

Without us there is less colour, less life, less soul, less vibrancy and less love. We are the ones that turn it into a home, whether it is a mansion, a small apartment, a trailer, a car, a cardboard box or a doorway. We are the ones who care, nurture, tend, love and protect our homes and those within them. It's what we must do.

It is also what we must do for our communities. We are just as much the heart of our community. We need to bring that life, love and nurturing to not only our homes but also to our wider community.

We must join together to breathe life into the community within which we live.  We must take it, shape it and nurture it, make it our own and help to create a strong, vibrant, living community for who live within it.

It is time to call on the memories of women of old, our mothers, and grandmothers, throughout time who did exactly that without even thinking about it. Community was a way of life for them, not something to work at or think about, simply something they did, every day. They were the beating heart not only of their families but also of their wider community.

It is time to assume the mantle that they bequeathed to us that was forgotten by progress and the advancement of civilization,  for if there was ever a time the world needed us to create community, that time may well be now.

Neighbours no longer know neighbours, families are scattered across the county and across the world. Community once had meaning, when joys, and tragedies, felt by one were felt and shared by all.

In many ways progress is a good thing, occasionally though there is a need to step back and recreate something from the past, in our own way, for our own time, and make it new and relevant again. It is time now to make community mean something again, not some vague ideal, rather a living breathing reality for the benefit of all who live there.