La Casa Chica: Scavenger Hunting & Neighborhood Blogging

You have found your way to the virtual front stoop of "La Casa Chica," a fitting name for the kind of home I am wanting to create. I hope it will contribute to the growing sense of connection and belonging here in my Central-Cocoanut neighborhood, in the Newtown community of Sarasota, Florida.

La Casa Chica is "the little house," modest in size relative to the other houses on the block and in the neighborhoood.

La Casa Chica is "the enchanted house," with its 1920's Spanish eclectic architecture, its emerging tradition of front-stoop and kitchen conversation, and its resident puppy, Gus.

La Casa Chica is "the home of the beloved child," brought to life through the everyday presence of neighborkids, whose natural inclinations to be social and exuberant generate the special, neighborly spirit of the place.

La Casa Chica is a reclaiming of the legitimate role and relationship of neighbor, which is often less recognized than that of family or professional, but can be powerful and transformative nonetheless.

If Jane Addams were to drop by, I hope that she might recognize La Casa Chica as Hull House reinvented, a century later...

If Jane Jacobs were to drop by, I hope that she might recognize La Casa Chica as an effort to get beyond "the mask of pretended order" that is affecting our community, and to nurture the "real order that is struggling to exist."

If Donald Winnicott were to drop by, I hope that he might recognize La Casa Chica as a place where neighbors choose to get together "to do the things which you can do better than you can be taught to do them."

And if Timothy Leary were to drop by, I hope that he might recognize La Casa Chica as an everyday, real-world, neighborhood-scale embracing of his notion that "the universe is an intelligence test."

But mostly, I hope that my neighbors will drop by.

I am ready to be a neighbor.

Monday, June 14, 2010

Scavenger Hunting & Neighborhood Blogging

The 2010 "season" of scavenger hunting has now started! Here are a few pics from the kick-off barbecue and also the first hunt.

This year we are going to try to use neighborhood blogging as a way to share the discoveries of the neighborhood scavenger hunters. We've been accepted as a beta test neighborhood for "Neighborlogs," a neat online blogging platform that makes it possible to share and also map stories by neighbors. Neighborlogs is described as an innovative technology for "community-driven, neighborhood-focused, sustainable sites," and Central-Cocoanut is the only neighborhood in Florida (as far as we know!) that has been invited to join as a test site.

All to say - instead of looking to the "La Casa Chica" blog for details about scavenger hunting this summer, check out the Central-Cocoanut neighborhood blog here!

La Casa Chica

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Monday, June 14, 2010

Scavenger Hunting & Neighborhood Blogging

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