February 2017
What improvements would you like to see in Crestone?
Kyle Grote
I think we could really use some kind of Rec Center, a place for kids to go – a gym that’s open all year ‘round. We’re kind of seasonal here. You can’t be outside all the time, ya know? And more opportunities for kids. I moved my kids out to the middle of nowhere, thinking it’s a safe, nice place, but I didn’t quite realize there might be a lack of opportunities. More classes – drama class, art class – more things they can get into. We bring quite a few visitors here and I think we need to keep doing that in a balanced way, I mean, we never want this place to be quite like Sedona! And we all kind of agree by being here that we do without some things. But I think the biggest thing to focus on is really for the kids. Keep improving the schools – I’m not saying anything bad about the schools! – but keep improving them, make ‘em better, make sure education is top of the line. And whatever way we can keep creating more jobs. It’s one of the things that I think is the hardest thing about living out here is you have to work 2-3 different jobs. More opportunities for kids and more job employment I would say are my 2 biggest things.
Sharon Landrith
Well I just want to preface that I love Crestone and I love living here. I think it’s beautiful, one of the most unique places on the planet, and I enjoy the people. I feel privileged to be able to live here. I think what I would want to see improved would be that all of the amazing individuals who are brilliant, intelligent leaders and visionaries could speak freely and simultaneously embrace the sense that we are all interconnected. That we could actually listen to each other, from that place of “we’re all in this together.” We’ve come from the same roots, we have the same essence and we share the same body as the earth. I think that gets shoved under the rug with our amazing individual visions and voices and independence. So, I’d like to see that improved, more than anything. Also, I know Crestone really loves their children, yet I would like the kids to be not just cared for, entertained and educated, but I’d like us to be able to listen to the kids – they’re remarkable. They’ve come in with a certain wisdom and strength and connection to the earth and each other. They’re amazing humans. I feel it is vital that as a community, we listen to their wisdom and hear them. They have a tremendous wisdom and they’re inheriting whatever it is that is forming itself right now.
Michael Pacheco
I think the biggest improvement would be to recognize that this isn’t a retirement community anymore. It’s a community of people that like to do and create things, and if we can unite behind that idea and create things that help people create, then I think we’ll all be a lot better off. Crestone has the opportunity to reach out to the world. A lot of people come here, then go on to do really cool things in other parts of the world and are making a big impact. This seems to be a hub for really big ideas and I’d like to see us do the best we can to support that. Also, affordable housing here would be amazing. It’s really, really hard for people to make a living. There are ways to make money here, but not ways to make enough money to pay outlandish retirement-home rents, and it would be really neat to see people of normal income means actually sustain a life here. I think that could help a LOT – just make everyone happier and healthier. To have an affordable, stable place to live would be HUGE for a lot of people. And, I don’t have the answer to that, but definitely a need.
Kirsten Schreiber
First of all, I want to say that this is a really fine community with so many resources and there’s so much we can do here, I think. And I love your question because it makes me think of what my priority is. And I probably have several areas I’m very interested in, but the one I’m working on is the Living Wisdom housing project for elders, for our wise people (hopefully!) to live in community together, and hopefully very close to town. I’m a nurse-aid, and I’ve seen how difficult it is to help older people that live out in the Baca and in the Grants. However, even though it is the Living Wisdom that I’m a part of and I hope more people will come and want to be part of that, there are also so many great projects going on here I think are beautiful too, and so I would love for us to come together and put our energy into as many as possible. That’s really what I would love to see happen here is that we put more energy into taking care of each other’s needs, supporting each other in projects.
Dorje Root
I would love to see some kind of healing center/clinic. A place where people could go – I’m just going to give you my ideal here – where there would be an MD, and all kinds of alternative healers, herbalists. It would be the place to go for any kind of health care, and you wouldn’t have to drive all the way to Alamosa or Salida. There would be an Herb School and other healing schools associated with it so the students could be learning about herbs, and whatever other modalities we’d incorporate there, while they’re working with people. I had this vision before I even came here. It would be sort of like a hub with the clinic and the different schools. The way I see Crestone, it’s kind of like a microcosm, like you can do things here that you might like to do in the whole world but the whole world is too big. The whole country’s too big. The whole state is too big. But Crestone is just right. So, you can do things here, and make them work here, and then you take them out into the world, and that’s how I see a lot of the things here, including the Spiritual Centers. There are a lot of ideas that people have here that can work in a microcosm.
Tim Brenner
I would like to see improvements in understanding and communication. I know that’s a broad topic and hard to get specific about. I moved here in ’88 when it was much smaller. There was always some kind of fellowship meeting going on all the time, either at Curt’s, the post office, or the Road Kill Cafe. Now it seems that as our culture in general has kinda split a little bit, that has happened somewhat in Crestone. I know I sometimes put out too much on Facebook when there’s issues and discussions and conflicts going on. I now realize it’s not going to happen there very well. It’s gotta happen somewhere eye to eye. You gotta be able to look at who you’re talking to and resist any temptations to be screaming, yelling and accusing. I think we have an opportunity in Crestone, with the small amount of people here working together and coming to a place where something can be different. I don’t even know how to ask or recommend for these improvements to happen, other than for people to truly have that desire to live peacefully with their neighbors, even when there’s conflict, and find ways to either accept differences or discuss them, and work out a different synthesis of thinking beyond just “this one against that one.”