Comments

Websites and walking

Just recently I’ve been directed towards a couple of websites to help me understand our local area. One was a government website showing national statistics about wealth, health, education, deprivation. Another was a new website showing crime figures in the town, the same week a colleague from another part of the Deanery came to visit. We are both fairly new in our respective parishes. Over the course of a fairly soggy afternoon we walked through Highbridge, chatted to those we met, talked about the local area and reflected about being in our new parishes. As I walked past Churchfield School just after 3pm with my colleague we were greeted with smile after smile of cheery hellos and waves. Nearly everybody we passed that afternoon said hello and many stopped to pass the time of day. At the end of the afternoon I was very conscious of some of the difficulties in our area, very conscious of the number of empty shops along the High Street and very conscious of the amount of rubbish we saw abandoned on many of our roads. I was also very conscious of living in a community of extended families who help and support each other, conscious of residents looking out for each other and of numerous dedicated individuals determined to do what they can for this community. The websites gave cold hard facts; one indicated that Highbridge was far from the best place to live, another suggests we live in an area with not insignificant crime rates. I think I’ll hold on to the cheery smiles and friendly hellos. I’ll value those conversations with people to try and find out more about our community and although statistics and facts on a website are helpful they only scratch the surface of what really makes our community tick.

                                             Your friend and parish priest

                                                                         Rev Sharon