Page 18 - December 2019

PERSPECTIVES

Living in Forest Grove has its advantages. It’s home once stood. The city does not maintain
a small community with rich roots deep in the sidewalks and it’s the responsibility of the

Oregon history, almost hiding the vast Pacific owner to do so. Sadly, they either no longer own
University campus in its midst. A quiet town the property or have passed on.
which seems to come alive with the hustle and Walking to the grocery store is especially
bustle of any university community during fraught with danger this time of year with the

Pacific’s graduation cycle or the world renown leaves covering missing areas or cracks causing
Concours d’elegance Car show, coming alive with a misstep or two on the journey. Don’t ask me
visitors, families and friends in the late spring about the ice and snow either. One (and I include
and summer. myself in this category,) is required to pay more

In the fall, on occasion, one may hear the attention as to where one walks rather than the
roar of the crowd, the announcements and music beautiful scenery surrounding them.
wafting through the air from the sports complex I was astounded and delighted one day to see
stands. Normally, however, Forest Grove turns a bad section of sidewalk had been removed and

into a sleepy little town nestled in the beginnings a new, clean crack-free walkway put in its place.
of the Cascade Range and one wonders whether And then I noticed them-little paw prints now
the sidewalks do roll up or not by seven o’clock! immortalized in the concrete. At first, I thought,
At least my favorite coffee shoppe (and “office”) who would have let their dog walk here? Couldn’t

does. they see the obligatory yellow CAUTION tape
Yet one of its pluses is also one of its drawbacks. fluttering in the breeze? Perhaps the dog had
It’s a town one can walk through, marvel at just run unaccompanied onto the wet cement?
the tree lined streets, the brick walkways on I peered closely, and instead of what I had

campus…and the most horrendous and perilous believed to be canine paw prints, instead the
sidewalks I have ever trod upon or seen. Many small impressions were from a young racoon.
of these broken, missing, or uplifted pavement- I had often glimpsed a racoon family in the
front properties are now vacant where a family neighborhood peering at me from their tree,

18 ONE COMMUNITY