Middle Age and Middle School

Why parks? I get that question all the time. People want to know why we started this organization for the purpose of building parks. Like many decisions the answer is a composite of many reasons.

First, I do enjoy parks.

Second, if we don’t create new parks who will?

Third, we had an opportunity.

And after editing out the longer responses to the first 3 reasons we finally come to the main reason. I am in my middle age and have a child in middle school. I may not be unique in that I have found that it is not always easy for middle age parents to have substantive conversations with middle school age children. When I ask mine to join me and our dog Junebug for a little hike at the park near our home I usually don’t get a positive response. Sometimes I just go to the park with Junebug. But other times I push a little harder and the hike starts out with a somewhat grumpy middle aged person and a somewhat more grumpy middle school student that would rather be watching videos on an iPad. But off we go. We hike along noticing interesting mushrooms and flowering plants. And Junebug chases the squirrels. And we stop to skip stones into a pond. And we see a deer or a snake or a butterfly.  And before long I notice something else.  We have been talking. I hear about paper that is due next week. I hear about a new friend. We talk about conflicts or problems. We share funny stories. We talk.

And that is why we build parks.

Happy Trails

Bill Jones