The energy of the nearly 100 residents who attended the meeting at the Winona Community House was exhilarating, and the "can-do" attitude of those with Main Street was plain contagious. I love big ideas, but I love big ideas with a step-by-step implementation plan even better!
With a little window dressing and a joint strategy between Montgomery County and Winona on the Coliseum/Recreation Park complex, Winona can certainly become a destination for ball tournaments, special events, relocation, and shopping.
We have got the nuts and bolts of a great community - top notch schools, great quality of life, low crime rate, central location, and so on. We just need a dash of style to show off our best features.
Well done to Sharon Kent, Sue Stidham, Janet Harper, and all those elected officials participating in the project.
Now let's get to work and make those wonderful plans a reality.
Good gracious! It is hotter than Satan's parlor outside.
Monday as I visited some local merchants in Carrollton and North Carrollton, my face literally melted and ran down my neck. I was mortified when I glanced at myself in the rearview mirror on my way back to my office and noticed my mascara trickling down my cheeks. I was very 1980's-hair-band chic.
Seriously, I can't remember a hotter, more miserable summer, and I love summer. Notoriously cold-natured, I relish the hot, humid Mississippi temperatures, but this is ridiculous.
The air conditioning at my home and office can't keep up, and I end up sprawled across my bed at night on top of the covers with the ceiling fan on jet-airplane speed. I believe it will eventually twist its way through the ceiling and launch into the neighbor's yard.
There is just not enough chilled watermelon, iced tea, and grape popsicles in the world to stop the sweat.
Winona's Sara Dacus stopped by my office Monday and reflected on her childhood with no air conditioning, gas heaters, or ice makers.
"We would go out in the field and work all day," Dacus said. "We didn't have cold water, ice cubes, or Coca Cola. Can you imagine?"
She said in the winter her entire family would gather around the fireplace to keep warm.
"We would have to fight for a place next to the fire," she laughed. "Back then, you could see the outside from the cracks in the house."
That kind of makes my self-pity seem a bit, well, pitiful.
During my lifetime, I have had the luxury of central heating and air conditioning, a refrigerator with ice maker, and electric blankets. Today, air conditioning can be found in most homes, and ice cubes - there is a machine at the corner of Applegate and Summit Streets that makes jumbo bags of fresh ice. You simply insert your money, and presto, a 10 pound bag of golf-ball-sized cubes.
Every generation relishes in the technological advancements: Radio, television, internet, self-cleaning ovens, and air-shocked enhanced athletic shoes. The problem is future generations take for granted those little luxuries. Well, until the cable goes out, the air conditioning breaks, and the computer gets a virus.
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