Thank You

We hope you enjoyed our First Annual Pleasant Valley Coop Tour.

After personally checking many of you in at our educational kick-off, I had the pleasure of visiting a number of backyard chicken coops myself. I chatted with our gracious coop hosts to see how their experience was, and I was so pleased to hear from all of them that they were having a wonderful time. While they, of course, enjoyed visitors local to our little Pleasant Valley community, they were also collectively thrilled that we had so many visitors new to PV. We had visitors from San Rafael, San Anselmo, Mill Valley, Fairfax, Vallejo, and more. It was exactly what I’d hoped for.

From a financial standpoint, the intent of this event was to raise money for our public elementary school, however, this event wasn’t just about fundraising. It was about reconnecting with people, with our neighbors, and with our community at large. It’s about making that long drive home, and understanding that the guy in the next lane over really just wants the same thing. For me, I feel a sense of comfort wash over me when, in my case, I take the DeLong Avenue exit. I look up at the banner to see what events are coming to our town. I take the turn to downtown so I can slowly cruise down Grant Avenue and see the stores and restaurants. I pray that my favorite restaurants like Finnegan’s and Tuscan Country Grill are busy and that our favorite shops like Old Town Sports and Morris and Company can continue to compete with big box stores and online retailers. I expect many of you share similar feelings when you roll into your hometown.

Thirty years ago I was bothered that everywhere I went—the post office, the grocery store, the deli—people knew me, my sisters, and my parents. It would take twice as long for my mother to complete the grocery shopping because she seemingly had friends to catch up with on every aisle. And they seemed to know everything about me. And if they didn’t know me, they wanted to get to know me. That was just what people did. Ironically, what I despised as a teenager, I long for today. I’m disappointed when people in my own neighborhood don’t look up and return my wave when I drive down the street. And I’m disheartened when they don’t answer the door for kids trying to sell cookies and popcorn to raise money for school programs. I ask myself, how is it that I’ve lived in the same neighborhood for eight years, but I don’t know the first names of the couple that lives two doors down?

The PV Coop Tour gives us an opportunity to relearn how to be a good friend and neighbor. There is something so personal about being invited into someone’s backyard. After the tour today, I got together with a few different coop hosts who shared stories about the people they’d met that day. They talked about the really cool couple in Indian Valley that they’d hoped would join the tour next year. They talked about the two cute young couples that had recently moved to Novato, met for the first time on the tour, and, coincidentally, had each purchased homes the other had viewed during their recent house-hunting efforts. I heard one story after another, and they were all so positive.

Thank you for joining us on the PV Coop Tour. We hope you found it to be an enjoyable, unique experience. Next year’s tour promises to be even better. We have received incredible support for continuing this event, have sponsorship interests, and have many more coop hosts eager to join. We welcome any comments on your experience, and would appreciate feedback on what more you would like out of future tours. Please email us at pvcooptour@gmail.com.

Sincerely,

Lisa Walsh, PV Coop Tour Co-chair