I read the Midweek Musings column written by my friend, the Rev. Rona Tyndall (the Times, Wednesday, Feb. 8).
I was distressed to learn of the potential loss of yet another Gloucester neighborhood that has, until now, retained a true sense of community.
It also saddened me to learn of the necessity for her and several neighbors to move away from a place that has been so dear to them and such an important part of their lives.
I spent nearly all of my life (from the age of 6 months) living in one of three such neighborhoods in West Gloucester. I just yesterday commented online about someone's suggestion that the West Parish School be closed and the property sold.
That school was a large part of a community that played a major role in the development of my value system. My closest friends, to this day, are people with whom I built friendships and relationships during my time at that school.
To this day, I have remained in contact with the last of my living West Parish teachers from that impressionable period in my life. Nearly my entire life experience has been shaped by the "community" that included West Parish School, my West Gloucester neighborhoods, and my West Gloucester church.
It really hurts me, more deeply than I seem to be able to express in words, to see neighborhoods, schools, and churches, fall to development.
My sons will never know the same joys that I experienced in my childhood at West Parish or even in the larger West Gloucester community, nor will they ever know the sense of belonging in the relative safety of a loving and caring neighborhood community such as I had the privilege to enjoy.
I hope this trend will not continue until Gloucester becomes just like so many other faceless cities and towns that have lost all sense of community.
Brian C. Spinney
Abbeville, S.C.
