COLUMN: Tales from the Gravel Ridge – Beauty from a Rosengard perspective

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 06/08/2024 (279 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The place our family called home for more than 20 years has left an indelible impression on all of us. It is impossible to erase from our minds and our collective memories the deep and lasting influence of that place on us. Nor would we want such an erasure to occur. Rosengard, and the Rosengard School shaped our lives and contributed to our sense of well-being in ways that had long-term effects on us as a family, but also on each of us as individual members. To enumerate what it is that makes this place, Rosengard, so significant for us, would vary from person to person, and from various memories that might arise under one circumstance or another.

For us as a family, my parents Cornelius and Katarina Falk played a fundamental role in setting an example of love and loyalty to each other and to their entire family. Their faith shaped how they lived their day to day lives, and how they expected our family to live as well. Their faith also reflected how they related to friends and neighbours.

Outside of my family and home life, there were also many elements of life in our community that were instrumental in how our lives were shaped and how we evolved. Our community was made up of individuals and families that tried, day by day to provide and care for their loved ones. Sometimes that labour of love was challenging for many, if not for all of us. We persevered however, and those were life lessons that also influenced each one of us.

The longer I reflect on what Rosengard means to me, the more I am reminded of the beauty of that place. I find that it takes some intensive research on the definition of the word beauty to get beyond the superficial definition of the term.

My experience of Rosengard as viewed from the effect it had on me during those approximately twenty years when it represented my home base, fills me with wonder and gratitude. Even though I did not necessarily live in my Rosengard family home during some of those later years, the community and what it represented nevertheless continued to have a defining influence on my own personal development. Viewing the countless acts of love and thoughtfulness that I saw demonstrated in my own family and in my community is to this day an immense inspiration to me. It was, in a very real sense, a place of beauty.

Rosengard also had its own natural beauty. Although it is many, many decades later, I still remember how filled with wonder I was looking up on a moonlit night in early spring, at the silvery fronds dangling from the poplar trees at the edge of our woodland. As the season advanced, the delicate pink blossoms of Manitoba`s prairie rose with its subtle fragrance filled us with delight, and not too much later, the columbine, demurely nodding its dainty head, adorned the path where the cows made their way to pasture. And, as if that weren`t enough, as the season progressed, the flaming orange of the prairie lily with its black stamens welcomed us to the pasture where horses and cows found nourishment.

There were many other natural wonders in Rosengard`s environment. I vividly recall seeing, as we neared the end of summer, enormous clusters of chokecherries. They were such a rich dark purple, they appeared to be almost black in colour dangling from the slender branches of its tree. And, not to be outdone, high bush cranberries grew nearby. They produced clusters of brilliant scarlet cranberries, filled with juiciness.

In 1955, the Jewish rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel wrote, “As civilization advances, the sense of wonder declines. Such decline is an alarming symptom of our state of mind. Humankind will not perish for want of information; but only for want of appreciation.”

What a sobering reminder for all of us.