January 2023 Homestead Headlines

Volume 67, Issue 1 January, 2023

Download the Headlines here

January 2023 Community Center Calendar

10 | HVLT Board Mtg |

13 | Artist Reception Carol Jacobsen 4-6pm |

17 | HVCA Board Mtg |

21 | HV Annual Meeting |

24 | Sanitary District Board Mtg |

1st/3rd Weds. | Tam Design Review Board Mtg |

Saturdays | A.A. Mtg | 10:00 AM

Message from General Manager Amy Torrano

Hello Friends,

It was so good to see many of you in person at the annual holiday party in December! We have such an amazing community. What do you enjoy most about your community?

In my past six months as general manager, I have met many incredible people, as well as seen a few deer, turkeys, and coyotes. This made me start thinking about community and what it is. Community is being a part of something and belonging somewhere. Many of us belong to more than one community. You may belong to a school community, or a work community and of course, you all belong to the neighborhood community.

I feel so fortunate that I am part of the Homestead Valley Community Association where we are creating a welcoming space of togetherness. Winter can be a time where we aren’t getting out enough because it is raining, or just really cold. Let’s all continue making this community a warm and inviting place to call home by checking in on neighbors and slowing down.

If you would like to see a class held here or have an event idea, please let me know. I would love to see winter indoor movie and pizza nights, morning coffee groups, and book clubs. I hope to see you at Carol Jacobsen's upcoming art reception on January 8.

Stay warm. Stay dry. Have a wonderful start to the New Year 2023!

Amy

Homestead Valley Annual Meeting

Saturday, January 21

4:30 - Potluck Social

5:30 - Meeting

Updates, Elections and Recognition

Special Guest: Dennis Rodoni

New from Chuck Oldenburg

"Homestead Valley Historical Chronicles"

The latest book by local historian Chuck Oldenburg "Homestead Valley History Chronicles" is a collection of 169 articles telling stories of life in Homestead Valley. Many of the articles are accompanied by a photo or map, usually from the archive of the Lucretia Little History Room in the Mill Valley Public Library. This book is a great companion to the Mill Valley History Vignettes volumes I and II also by Chuck Oldenburg.

Published by the Mill Valley Historical Society in 2022

“Mill Valley residents will enjoy learning about the earliest days of European settlement in Homestead Valley and continuing with more history into the mid-20th century.”

We have books in stock available for sale for $15.00 at the Community Center office. Please come by or call!

Teddy Bear Tea

Our first Teddy Bear Tea was a huge sell-out success! The events started with crafts and cookie decorating, then tea and hot chocolate with delicious scones, sandwiches, and cookies from Mill Valley Baking Company. After a story, Santa arrived with teddy bears for everyone!

The weather outside may have been frightful, but inside we were warm and cozy making this a new holiday tradition in Homestead Valley.

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Local Artist Series

Artist Carol Jacobsen

We are fortunate to have another Homestead Valley resident participating in our Local Artist Series at the Community Center. Since 2020, Carol Jacobsen has been working on her latest series-Women of Color and Accomplishment. Thirty one of her portraits are in her first book of the series published in 2021. She now has her second book published with another thirty one portraits. All of the portraits are of African American women, most of whom have been ignored in history books. Their beauty, grace and dignity shine in these paintings.

Using colors and painting styles influenced by Impressionist painters and others, Jacobsen combines the Black diasporic history with European art, merging popular and privileged cultures. Jacobsen often uses non-traditional skin tones in an attempt to decouple these women from their race, inviting users to see them anew.

Please join us for an art reception on Sunday, January 8

4-6pm at the Homestead Valley Community Center.

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Quiet Workspace at the Community Center

Do you work from home? Starting Thursday, January 5th, Homestead Valley Community Center will be available from 9-11am on Thursdays in January. If you need a quiet place to work with your laptop or a quiet place to read, we will be open upstairs for quiet work. We have free wi-fi, tea, and coffee. Take a break from your home office and come work from Homestead on Thursday mornings. Please email amy@homesteadvalley.org to confirm.

"On Foot In Homestead...."

Everyone in Homestead Valley who walks the trails or roads regularly will find Matthew Davis' articles timeless. This column originally appeared in the Homestead Headlines in February 1988.

-Curt Oldenburg (HVLT)

Alan, Aldo, and Us

On the way back from the Land Trust hike in January, Virginia Coolidge pointed out the house at La Verne and Melrose where Alan Watts used to live. He was living there when I first met him, a few years before I moved to Homestead. In one of his KPFA broadcasts he talked of the yard at that house.

The general subject was about western man's attempt to control nature. He argues that if you want to have a very neat typical suburban yard, with lawn, flowers, and trimmed hedges, then you will need to spend all your free time caring for it. In effect, the yard controls you. This idea has often come back to me over the years as I have devoted whole days to gardening. But for me, it is a willing devotion. I love working outside, not with any rigid ideal in mind, but with the idea of cooperating with growing things. I am happy to give myself to the land, to feel very connected to it. I receive far more than I give.

Hiking and working on the Homestead Valley Land Trust is an extension of this feeling to me, walking on the land with open eyes, ears, and heart is to be in an optimum relation to the world. It is an added pleasure to share this with others, as happened on January 24 at the hinterland hike.

Recently I read an article on the life of Aldo Leopold, the pioneer ecologist and author of A Sand County Almanac. As a young forestry graduate his ideal was to transform the wilderness into utility for man, with all huntable game, sport fish, and marketable trees. The sorry results of this approach caused him to reconsider. In the end he felt that the less we do to interfere, the better; that the earth should be respected as a wise living being, and approached with humility and wonder.

February 1988

Reprinted from “On Foot in Homestead A Hiker’s Journal of a Coastal Valley,” by Matthew Davis, 1988.