In his book of advice to the young, If This Isn’t Nice, What Is?, Kurt Vonnegut urges: “We have to continually be jumping off cliffs and developing our wings on the way down.” Sometimes in community building, as in life, we are not so much jumping off cliffs as being...
Hub Happenings in the Milan / Berlin / Gorham Region
Previous Events
The Recipe for Community
In early Hub days, we had the luck to work closely with Brittany Sampson, who we simply called “B.” A veteran community organizer and deep of heart, so many of her insights have followed me along in this work: they are road markers that I tend to go back to when I...
The Village Fires Still Burn
In “The Layers,” beloved poet laureate Stanley Kunitz writes, “When I look behind, / as I am compelled to look / before I can gather strength / to proceed on my journey, / I see the milestones dwindling / toward the horizon / and the slow fires trailing…” A seminal...
One Vast Glowiing Empty Page: Spring 2025
I saw that my life was one vast glowing empty page and I could do anything I wanted. -Jack Kerouac There’s a special kind of magic that bubbles up when the opportunity to tap into pure possibility arises. All too often, we see the borders of our realities as...
I’m Going to Show Up
Sometimes, community building can feel overwhelming. Observing our communities, the dire needs alongside the diversity of belief systems and ideologies, it really can feel like there’s no way to find a seat at the table for everybody. Yet, a key tenet of the work we...
The Hoping Machine
The Father of Folk, Woody Guthrie, says “...about all a human being is, anyway, is just a hoping machine.” It’s no accident that hope followed on the heels of calamity and terror when Pandora opened that infamous box. Hope is what gets us up in the morning and keeps...
Woven Together: Working with The Milan Village School
The Milan Village School is a community hub in its own right and the school as a whole works incredibly hard to be active contributors to the community. The sixth grade class, in particular, complete Community Service Learning Projects that they work on throughout the...
Arcana: Art Show at The Three Sisters
What began as a passion project among friends became a true example of creating a shared experience across a wide variety of community members. Local metalsmith Laura Jamison and sometimes artist, mostly community builder Mandy Bernd collaborated on an interactive...
Berlin Porchfest 2023
This event draws from the collective efforts and contributions of many to provide an experience for all. Berlin’s 2nd annual PorchFest was held on September 22, 2023. From 4 in the afternoon until 10 in the evening....
Trunk or Treat, Milan and Berlin 2023
Mandy participated in two Trunk or Treating events during the Halloween Season. Berlin Elementary School’s PTO hosted their Trunk or Treat at the Heritage Park in Berlin on October 24th. Milan’s Recreation Department hosted another at Milan Village School on October...
Stepping Up & Stepping Into Community
October is always the busiest of months. In the Androscoggin Valley, the Hub starts the month with PorchFest and ends with Spooky Season activities. Tucked in-between was the Coos Coalition’s Behavioral Health Convening. Looking back on the past month, what stands out to me is the way that neighbors continually step up, and step into, helping to make their communities warm, inviting, and strong.
Berlin’s PorchFest is a musical community event: neighborhoods across Berlin open their spaces to host a variety of local musicians. In the “Irish Acres,” The Emerald (St. Kieran’s Center for the Arts) supports PorchFest by helping to create a block party. We set up a stage in the street, invite vendors, and members of The Emerald create homemade desserts and warm soups and stews. On Norway Street, in Berlin’s Scandinavian Village, neighbors joined in planning this year. We met over dinner and worked together to provide a community BBQ, provide entertainment for the kiddos, and to create a block-wide feeling of camaraderie. Katie made a gigantic tub of macaroni salad, Holly’s grandchildren set up a lemonade stand, Barbara made dozens of treats, and Jessica allowed us to take over her driveway where Mike and Vicky from the HydroTavern cooked burgers and hotdogs. The best part of the day was watching folks sit down to eat together, taking a break from the hustle to chat and enjoy the music. Something that would not have happened without neighbors having created that environment.
Just a few weeks after PorchFest, folks from all over the North Country gathered at the Coos Coalition’s Behavioral Health Convening. Here, we saw dozens of parents and caretakers join in conversations to steer the direction of family services in our area. The presence of several fathers added to the conversation and, particularly within peer support, offered their time and energy to create spaces for themselves. Before the end of the day, Charlie and Corey’s excitement to lead the creation of spaces for dads began to form an outline of future activities: fishing derbies, compost and gardening projects, and a “Dad University” of sorts where they could share their knowledge and empower folks. Alongside ideas of how to get dads together, there was also an expressed desire to learn with one another: where and how to have the harder conversations about how to father.
In addition to seeing fathers stepping into leadership roles, Tired Mom’s Club participants Deb and Lisa took on roles in the planning process for the Convening. They both worked tirelessly throughout several months: Deb gathered dozens of raffle prizes, coordinated displays, and continually volunteered her time, voice, and energy; Lisa provided invaluable insight into how to best include and highlight family voice into the day through coordinating a “Dear Provider” and “Dear Family” display, as well as guiding the format of the day to best allow parents and caregivers to be comfortable in their participation. In addition to their work on the Convening, Deb and Lisa helped navigate Tired Mom’s Club throughout the busy month: helping to make decisions about when and where to meet, as well as designing and coordinating Tired Mom’s presence at Trunk or Treat at Heritage Park. Deb designed a Cookie Monster theme, created all components, bought extra candy, convinced her friend Stacy to wear a Cookie Monster costume for hours, and invited one mom after another to join us at our November get together.
The Hub Practice theme that has run throughout the month is: “Recognize the assets of others, and within communities. Notice what people love and what gives them energy. Seek out opportunities to unleash people’s potential and help open different ways to contribute.” It’s so easy to look at the landscape of our area and become overwhelmed by the scope and possibilities. What’s amazing is that over and over again, our neighbors show up and work shoulder to shoulder to make it all happen. The weight of our collective burden becomes lighter as more neighbors join in to help carry it together. Whether lending a hand or a voice, it all matters.