Festival is evidence of community

There are dozens of ways to judge the health of a community.

Some are scientific, relying on hard data. Some are more subjective, relying on a seat of the pants assessment.

Anyone using that more subjective yardstick who happened to visit the Pumpkin Fest last weekend would assure you that the Pennville community is very healthy indeed.

Plenty of festivals like this dot the calendar each year. Some are strong. Some are forlorn.

The Pumpkin Fest started out a few years back on a small scale, but it has consistently grown, attracting more vendors, creating new activities and engaging more people.

And engaging more people is exactly what events like this should be about. They get us out of the house and off the couch and away from the TV and the Internet. They dump Facebook by the wayside in exchange for face-to-face encounters with our neighbors, our friends and folks we’ve never met.

A stroll through Pennville’s park on Saturday was a bit like going back in time, a time when community wasn’t an empty word but something people felt in their hearts.

Kids were everywhere. Families were everywhere. And fun was easy to find.

The sense of community was authentic and genuine. It’s something that should be simultaneously cherished and built upon. — J.R.