Community

Visions of community have filled my mind since the birth of my first daughter almost fifteen years ago. The ideas encompassed much more than extended family but rather a complex system of cooperation that was based on making healthy life choices in an unhealthy world.

Over the years I shared my dreams with many others seeking similar ideals. I have held tight to what others told me was impossible. Many have come and gone and even some have returned years later to see aspects of the dream unfolding. Today, on this beautiful full moon, I am beginning to sense the depths of much hard work as the dream comes full circle.

We are in the last stage of our renovations for the community space of The Growing Green Co-op that will open this July. The space will serve as a distribution point for sustainable products and services throughout Connecticut in a city that desperately needs to be revitalized. The community center will house our earth based programs for kids including our six week youth activist camp, a healing space and workshop space where we will show films, offer how-to classes, host community events and our year round farmers market.

We have reached the tipping point. When government and the economic marketplace fail to provide quality goods and services to the public, people have historically cooperated to provide for themselves and their families. Co-ops form in response to local needs. The Growing Green Co-op is a consumer driven co-op that has evolved out of a desire for availability of high quality, local, sustainable products as well as the desire to support local, sustainable businesses through our Green Business Referral Network.

We are a vibrant community of extraordinary like-minded folk who are determined to grow our local economy- including the development of our own "CT Currency" while walking more lightly on the earth. Around me I have my immediate community that includes my Beloved and all of our children, "green" business leaders joining with us who are also striving to lead the way towards sustainable living & community members that have such diverse interests and talents who are looking to share with others. We are growing by leaps and bounds.

Persistence does pay off, but for me, it is just proof that when we follow our truth then we are led to places of wholeness. The community I desired to raise my children in has manifested around me. We live in a most magical world.