Reflections from Jericho, Vermont, on rebuilding civic life through local action, environmental care, and everyday kindness.
Repairing a Nation Starts at Home: How Community, Care, and Stewardship Shape Our Future
By Bernie Paquette
As we step into 2026, few argue that 2025 was an easy year. Across the nation, long-standing foundations were shaken, institutions fractured or abolished, and civility ruptured. The turbulence was real. But so is something closer to home: community.
Here in Jericho, we are more than residents of a country—we are neighbors. Friends. Families. People who, in countless quiet ways, still look out for one another. Even here, we faced challenges last year: disagreements and questions about resources, water, sewage, housing; in short, about our path forward. And yet, the most important question before us remains simple and urgent:
How do we take care of one another—and the world we share?
That care must include the living world around us. From insects that pollinate our food and recycle nutrients, to bears that wander our edges and help shape healthy ecosystems, we are part of something far larger than ourselves. Like the rest of the planet, Jericho is strained by unsustainable growth and consumption - how can we change that model? First, we each must define what we care about.
Which specific local issues do you care most about?
Here are some on my radar.
Slower and Safer Streets: The disquieting impact of the removal of the Browns Trace speed humps, while we wait for effective alternatives that foster self-regulating driver behavior, resulting in slower, safer streets.
Challenging conventional landscaping practices: The sterile monoculture of lawns and the active removal of leaves are detrimental to the essential wildlife needed for a healthy ecosystem.
Our unawareness of small non-human life that is often invisible to most of us when we fail to look closely, and appreciate the small creatures that are part of what sustains our world.
Large that we may be
In light, we may not see
those small in comparison
Yet large in their vital role
often invisible
- their presence and benefit.
What limited crops would we reap
without insect pollination and nutrient cycling?
Organic waste would bury mountains
without millions of tiny decomposers.
Food webs debased, natural pest control replaced
biodiversity fragmented
all from the loss of tiny six-legged creatures
whom we hardly know, living amongst us.
- Bernie Paquette
All organisms are equally marvelous and significant in contributing to the overall balance of the system. Diversity amongst people, as with all creatures, contributes to stability. - Practical Dreamer - Gerrit Smith and the Crusade for Social Reform, by Norman K. Dann.
Our leverage is local. It lies in daily choices: how we treat one another, how we use resources, how we demonstrate that we care.
Care often appears in small, practical forms:
- Reaching across generations so young people are not left isolated.
- Repairing and sharing instead of discarding and replacing.
- Slowing down outdoors and rediscovering wonder close to home. ”When you slow down and look closely, the world grows infinitely larger."
- Planting native flowers, shrubs, and trees, stewarding what remains wild.
- Questioning habits that harm ecosystems, from monoculture lawns to leaf removal.
- Asking for help—and offering it freely.
- Asking “What then is thy neighbor?” [They are] “a mass of states, of experiences, thoughts, and desires, just as real as thou art… This is for thee the turning-point of thy whole conduct toward him.” -Josiah Royce (American philosopher)
- Ask others: “Help me understand your perspective.”
- We can all ask ourselves, “Is the world a better place because we are in it?”
Moments that matter. “Life is built on small moments between people. A conversation that shifts someone’s perspective. A kindness that arrives exactly when someone is about to give up. Showing up when it's inconvenient. Listening when you would rather talk.” - Source: see appendix: I'm 87... This One Question Changed How I See Everything*
Years ago, on a bitterly cold winter night while fighting an apartment fire in Winooski, my hands were so cold I was unable to remove my thick wool firefighter gloves. Yet what lingers with me is not the cold, but that unknown person in the warming bus who wordlessly took off the gloves and placed my hands in theirs to warm mine. That small, wordless act of human care has stayed with me for decades, a quiet reminder of how deeply we can affect one another in moments of need.
That is how communities are rebuilt—not through grand gestures, but through steady, ordinary kindness. We can lower our self-imposed barriers of opinions, and emotions (fear, anger…) by using our ability to love and care.
We can consider our beliefs and convictions as benchmarks (open for review), not walls.
We can continue to be a values-driven community, caring for and accepting people for who they are — be willing to listen to understand and learn, even when our views and opinions differ. We can, together, find solutions to issues that threaten our values.
What does caring get you? You receive warm emotions, witness happiness, feel love, gain a deeper understanding, and live in a world more beautiful.
In 2026, let’s commit to one simple promise: caring for Jericho—its people, its land, and its future. One small act at a time is how we build something better.
If repairing a nation begins anywhere, it starts right here—at home.
Here are a couple of ideas for fun and getting together—part of the fabric that creates bonds, fosters compassion, a desire to share, and helps us relate, understand, and learn from each other.
Valentine Skate: Ice rink, hot chocolate, a campfire, and S’mores, along with a playlist to soundtrack the ice skating.
Gingerbread house bake-off: Display the entries at the library and auction them off in support of the library.
Story Telling Event: Live storytelling by folks in our Community, emulating The Moth Story Telling competition: “An open-mic storytelling competition in which anyone can share a true, personal, 5-minute story on the night's theme. True stories, told live and without notes. Honoring the diversity and commonality of the human experience. A curated live event featuring storytellers who share true stories on an array of topics, creating an experience that is intimate, inspiring, captivating, theatrical, and enlightening.”
What are the means of repairing and healing a nation - whatever it is, begins close to home. What is your best way to build community? Let us know!
Wishing you all a New Year where the world becomes a better place because you are in it.
Laugh, Dream, Try, and Do Good
Bernie
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