How We Went From Renting to Owning in Green Acres
By Kevin Polk
When Kimberly and I started visiting homes for sale in Bloomington two years ago, we looked briefly at Green Acres. We liked the idea of living within walking distance to IU and a short bicycle ride from the library, the farmer's market and downtown. We also liked the schools that served the neighborhood.
However, we didn't like the noisy rentals or the IU traffic that cut the heart of Green Acres into a harrowing warren of speedways twice a day. We saw a few clumps of houses that still looked settled and inviting to families. But they all lay practically on top of the Bypass. So our search soon turned elsewhere.
We were both ready to set down roots. We had lived in eight states. We had become experts at holding garage sales, packing, shipping and postal regulations. Now we wanted to plant a garden and raise pets and children. We wanted anything but a sterile, anonymous apartment life.
In the spring of 2006, I completed a permaculture course. For a final project, I worked with Green Acres residents Ann Kreilkamp and Sylvia Van Bruggen to establish a neighborhood plan. Their enthusiasm was infectious, so we looked into the neighborhood again. When we realized we weren't quite ready to buy, a nice rental turned up on 8th street.
Our year on 8th street went much better than our time in various commuter apartments. Kimberly enjoyed her daily walks to IU through all four seasons. I took the GOES and Habitat Stewards courses and kept a low profile with my sustainable gardening activities at first. But I eventually observed that among the five houses on the block, there were already four organic gardens, an orchard, two or three compost piles, two backyard wildlife habitats, a greenhouse and a passive solar home. Neighbors started turning up at permaculture events.
As we became involved with GANA events and the Neighborhood Plan, it gradually dawned on us what a gem this place was. Residents of four and five decades missed the days when children playing in the streets and yards bound the community together. These elders especially seemed to appreciate efforts to recapture a lost sense of place through neighborhood events, signs, rain gardens and traffic calming. Since many had seen so much of the world used up in their lifetimes, they also encouraged all efforts to make Green Acres a sustainable village. Our landlords seemed delighted with our straw mulches, native plantings, leaf mold bins and tiny vegetable plot, having done plenty of organic gardening when they lived on the property long ago.
When we began to look for a house in spring of 2007, we focused on Green Acres. Yes, it was noisy and carved by traffic. But young families were starting to move in. The neighborhood plan was complete and GANA was full of energy. We looked beyond what the neighborhood was, to what it was becoming again.
We finally bought a house on Edwards Row. In July, while hauling boxes and furniture, we realized that this was our first move to a place where we already knew people. One of Kimberly's colleagues had lived in our house for 28 years. Our neighbor Stan two doors up told us about seeing our house built fifty years ago, on an open field at the edge of town.
The house has plenty of yard space and an unshaded south-facing roof. We've begun a program of energy upgrades which we hope will culminate in geothermal heating and cooling and solar panels on the roof. The neighboring yards sport plenty of native and edible plants. We have begun planting trees, flowers and salad greens in the yard. They seem to be setting down roots. So are we.
Friday, October 5, 2007
Buying In
Tuesday, January 17, 2006
Featured resident
Our mailman, Rob Vernon 307 N. Jefferson
Our intrepid, courteous and ever-cheerful mailman, Rob, aka Robville Cleo Vernon, as of March 1, 2005, had been on the job for “32 years, months, 17 days, 13 hours and 45 seconds.” He says what he likes best is “watching everybody grow old. I see the students struggle to get through school but do well and graduate. And another batch moves in. I love all my customers but I especially love my long-time customers.”
When asked how we could make his work easier or more pleasant, he says,“Only one item comes to mind. Please shovel all snow no matter how little there is off walks and steps.”
Of the funny things that have happened to him on the job, this one is a doozer. “I got my belt hoop on my shorts caught in a screen door handle and ripped my shorts off. I called my wife to bring out another pair. Thank Goodness I was wearing my underwear!”
He won’t tell us who gets the most mail on his route, citing the World War II motto: “Loose Lips Sink Ships.”
Finally, Rob tells us that another thing he likes best about his job is “counting the days ‘til 8-18-07. That’s when I retire. Let me quote the Late Great Martin Luther King: ‘Free at last. Free at last. Thank God almighty I am free at last.’”
Not surprisingly, given Rob’s wonderful attitude, when people apologize for the volume of their mail, or when he delivers a particularly heavy package, he replies, “That’s fine with me, thanks for the business! Need all I can get.”
One resident who had just moved with her husband to Bloomington and Green Acres reports that, when her husband then died suddenly, Rob told her to put all the junk mail addressed to him back in the mailbox, and he would stamp “Deceased” on each envelope and sent it back. She says that he will never know how much she appreciated that generous act during her time of loneliness and grief.Original post by Melody
Welcome new residents
It was difficult for those in Green Acres who knew Dorothy Spencer to accept the fact that her health was failing and that it was time for her to sell her home and move closer to her daughter in Mooresville where she could get more care and attention on a daily basis from her family.
But now that the transition has taken place we are so pleased that Phil and Noriko chose Dorothy’s house in Green Acres Neighborhood as their place to settle in Monroe County.
It was Indiana University that brought Phil and Noriko to Bloomington. Phil came in 1989 to earn his B.A. and stayed on for the laid-back lifestyle. Noriko arrived in 1994 and eventually earned a Ph.D. After post-doc work at UNC in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, she returned to work for the School of Library and Information Science (SLIS) beginning in 2001. Phil says that the two met by providence in 2002. They were married in Bloomington in June 2004 and went to Kauai for their honeymoon.
Noriko teaches information science courses in SLIS and conducts research in the area of social informatics, which is the study of how computerization influences society. “My work keeps me busy,”she says, “but when I have time, I like to watch movies and work out at the gym, especially the kick-bo class.”
This summer they plan to build a brick porch onto the back of their house. It will provide a nice place to relax in the evening or to hang out with friends and have cook-outs.
Phil works as a reference assistant for the Monroe County Public Library in addition to teaching three classes at the IU library school. He’s an avid reader of science fiction, a semi-skilled musician, a fan of IU basketball (He’s been going to games since 1975), and he actually enjoys mowing the yard and trimming hedges. He,too, is looking forward to working on the new porch project.
The story of how “Ole Fat Bellers”, their cat, became part of the family is an interesting one...
Phil worked at Little Zagreb for four years before attending library school. One of the servers had allergies that were getting worse as she got older, and she asked Phil if he’d be interested in one of her cats. You could say that it was love at first sight. Ole Fat Bellers was two at the time and about 6 pounds lighter. He'll be nine in October and has settled comfortably into the new neighborhood at a steady weight of 15 pounds.
When asked what they like about Green Acres Neighborhood Noriko replied. “The original reason I decided to live in this neighborhood was because it's so close to where I work. I try to ride my bike as much as possible when the weather is nice. The lots here are bigger than newer developed sub-divisions, and people are willing to work to make the neighborhood better.” She also likes the fact that each house has it’s own character, unlike many newer neighborhoods where they all look so much alike.
Phil says, “I like being close to downtown Bloomington and IU. I can ride my bike to work or to grab a bite to eat (you've probably seen me tooling around the neighborhood on an old Little 500 bike). I also like the fact that the neighborhood association is so active. I was very excited to learn that there was a forum via which I could meet my neighbors and discuss issues of concern and interests relevant to the neighborhood and its place in the Bloomington community.”
