Hood up and chin tucked deep into my scarf, one cold recent morning, I heard welding. Peering out from under the hood and over the scarf, I found myself at one of the vantage points from which it’s possible to see into the site where the new Logan School is under construction. Sure enough, there was a man kneeling next to a steel post. The light of his torch illuminated his helmeted-and-visored head and heavily gloved hands, sparks flying as he worked.
Seeing him intent on his task that grey morning brought to mind how much we all depend on each other, whether or not we will ever exchange a word. Because of that man and his coworkers, the new school will be strong and functional and safe for generations of children and those who lead them. We all count on people who make good welds. Society rests on them.
Coming back up the hill of our street today, another blustery grey day, I saw someone else hard at work with sparks flying. This one wasn’t welding. He was doing something noisy to a sign on a sign pole. The nearby pickup bore Ann Arbor’s city seal, so whatever he was doing was official.
He reached up and gave the sign a tug. It didn’t give. After a few more flying sparks, he gave it another tug, and down it came. He set in on the ground for a moment while he worked on the pole itself, then tossed the sign into the bed of the pickup and drove away.
The tool he’d been using looked like a sander but my sister Marilyn, who knows about these things, assures me it was a grinder. She says a grinder is like a sander for metal and that that’s why there were sparks. It’s good to be able to ask her about such matters.
So why was he removing a city sign? It was an old Neighborhood Watch sign, and our city council voted recently to remove them, at the behest of a constituent who raised the matter with a council person. The signs went up more than half a century ago, in an effort to make neighborhoods safer. We’ve since learned that not only do the signs not make neighborhoods safer, they “reinforce fear and erode neighborly trust.”
For the majority culture, the signs seem neutral, if we notice them at all. To minorities, they can seem threatening. Neighborhood Watch no longer functions here in any case, and the signs are coming down. My guess is that most folks won’t even notice they’re gone. I wouldn’t have missed our sign, had the dog and I not walked by as it made its exit.
Marilyn’s mailbox has been making unsanctioned exits, she e-mailed recently. It was “de-posted by the plow for the third or so time. I had to haul the box up the long, steep driveway with a cart because it was so heavy and snowy. I let it thaw in the garage overnight then I scoped out my plan of action. Like a pit crew team of one. I had to reinforce the remaining wood on the base of the box. This wasn’t bad since it was done in the garage. The outside work had to be well thought out because I knew I had a limited amount of time to reinstall it before I was too cold to move my fingers. I carted the box back down the drive with a drill hanging from my right pocket and long screws poking me in my left. I plopped the box on the remaining wood, leveled it and grabbed the screws and drill. In a matter of 60 seconds I had sunk 5 screws into the post and was on my way back to the warmth of the house. Record pit time. Yeah me and my Makita drill.”
She and I chatted yesterday, and she asked what was going on around here. I told her about the Crow Party the library threw. “All invited to make crow-themed crafts and mill around pretending to be crows,” the notice in the Observer said. “Wear black and bring a shiny trinket to trade.” Marilyn said she wouldn’t have gone, for lack of a shiny trinket she’d be willing to give up.
“Don’t you have any more of those miniature wrenches you leave at geocaches?” I asked. Marilyn is Ms FxIt, after all.
“You’re right,” she said. “I do have some. And the crows would probably like a shiny little wrench.”
She let a beat pass and then added, “Crows are tool users, you know.”
20 February 2026