Tammy Schmitt

Tammy has been on my mind for the past few days.

I’ve been talking to my roommate Robin about high school. I graduated from Honesdale High School four and a half years ago. Thinking back, it seems both much more recent and much more distant than the time suggests.

Robin and I have been trading funny stories, teachers we liked, teachers we didn’t, fights we witnessed, people who died. It was during one of these conversations that I remembered her.

Two weeks after high school graduation, Tammy Schmitt was killed in a car accident. She was crushed by a tractor-trailer when the car she was riding in changed lanes.

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Do you see what I see?

By ALEGRA JENNINGS

Without a quick dictionary reference, my definition of “vision” or “sight” is the ability to see; accordingly, visioning is the act of seeing. It is the act of taking images—whether physical or metaphorical—and focusing them so as to make sense to the viewer. From a community perspective, visioning is the ongoing, collective images in the lens of a community, a town, a village. It encompasses the core elements of a thriving community—educational institutions, health care facilities, local economic activities, adequate housing, and political, cultural and recreational components.

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Brass rats (and one class act)

Stop me if you’ve heard this one:

So this guy goes into a junk store in San Francisco, and he sees this weird looking brass rat, which he decides he just has to have for his apartment. So he asks the shopkeeper, “How much for the brass rat?”

“Twelve bucks for the rat,” he says, “and a hundred bucks for the story that goes with it.”

The guy says, “Forget the story, you can keep it,” pays for the rat, and leaves. As he walks out on the street, rats come out of the alleyways and follow him. The farther he walks, the more rats appear, and soon there are millions of rats gaining on him. Terrified, he runs to the bay, and heaves the brass rat off a dock as far as he can. The rats follow it into the water and drown.

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