Banking on the community

Before we had newspapers and journalists, we had poets. When all communities were small and tribal, poets were sometimes leaders and prophets.

A prophet is a poet naming out loud the community’s pain. That is what some of the books, psalms and words of the Old Testament are.

In today’s paper is a Bob Skeele poem about KeyBank closing their La Conner branch in April. It is his response to the letter they mailed customers saying that to provide better service they are moving to Mount Vernon.

Skeele’s poem asks, “How are the users better served / making night deposits in another town?”

That’s a question account holders might choose to discuss. Ask also how much agency you might employ. Academics examine how much choice, or freedom, or control people have.

Are we – you, me – active citizens shaping our lives individually and collectively, or are we passive consumers, “voting with our dollars” but in reality being led but not leading, merely buying and not enlarging our lives because we are neither developing nor influencing key decisions?

Engaging in life starts with assessment and discernment. Analyze assumptions: Is it true that “better service is 10 miles away”? If not why are we told that? If KeyBank does not have your best interest in mind, why do they say they do?

This is from “Alice in Wonderland”:

“When I use a word,” Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, “it means just what I choose it to mean – neither more nor less.”

“The question is,” said Alice, “whether you can make words mean so many different things.”

“The question is,” said Humpty Dumpty, “which is to be master – that’s all.”

When a bank leaves a community, the term “community banking” becomes a lie.

The hard work of citizenship is an ongoing, lifetime effort, a process and not a product. Who contacted Ramon Hayes after he brought this issue up in council and suggested a Town bank? The Mayor offered leadership. Citizens need to follow up and follow through more than they need to follow.

Are we merely consumers, or citizens creating a future we shape by our ongoing efforts, turning our dreams into successes? There is a world of difference between accepting your fate and creating it. The latter is harder to do and seldom done alone.

Bank on it.