For students, awakening will come

ROSLYN RYAN Editor

Perhaps it is for the best that most of us, if it hasn’t happened already, will one day look back on our younger selves and realize just how little we knew back when we thought we knew everything.

This can only be a good thing, of course: Lord knows if you never have this realization, even if it takes a while to get there, it probably underscores the fact that you haven’t made much

Letters To The Editor

Industrial park a poor fit for Oilville area

Dear Editor,

Well so much for the rural atmosphere of Goochland. Allowing an industrial park on approximately 84 acres (half are in Hanover) at the corner of Oilville and Pony Farm roads will destroy the quiet rural nature of the surrounding neighborhoods. With the exception of a small self-storage facility, the surrounding area is comprised of single-family homes on spacious lots and/or acreage. The property values will most certainly decline as a result of the industrial park. Not to mention the increasing traffic along a narrow country road. What are the Goochland planners thinking?

Marla Cellucci Maidens

progress mentally, emotionally, spiritually or in any other sense.

Last week, after being invited to speak to a group of students at Stanford University, U.S. Circuit Court Judge Kyle Duncan was heckled and abused so badly by members of the student body that the fracas made international headlines. Clearly enraged and believing that their right to be heard superseded any obligation to be respectful of someone else’s views, they made a mockery of themselves, their school

Restrooms should be places of privacy for young people

Dear Editor, It is with great appreciation that I write to thank our school board members who so eloquently expressed privacy concern for children attending our schools in Goochland.

Looking back on my memories of school and remembering those experiences through the eyes of a little girl made me smile, especially in regards to such delicate matters as our girl’s restroom. Our restrooms merely existed for times when privacy was called for. It was probably the forerunner of today’s “safe spaces.” But girls could go there and have conversations with editorial & Business office and Mailing address: 8460 Times-dispatch Blvd. Mechanicsville, Va 23116

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Publisher Joy Monopoli ......................................... jmonopoli@RSnVa.com

Managing Editor laura McFarland lmcfarland@powhatantoday.com

Editor Roslyn Ryan ................................ rr yan@goochlandgazette.com

Sports Editor Robby Fletcher rfletcher@powhatantoday.com

Classifieds cindy adams ........................................ cadams@mechlocal.com

Production Manager denine d’angelo ddangelo@mechlocal.com and their individual causes.

“Your actions speak so loudly, I cannot hear what you are saying,” Ralph Waldo Emmerson once said, and in this case that certainly applied.

I would be willing to wager that every single person who has ever accomplished anything great—who has ever gone on to a become a respected leader or helped make the world better in any significant way—could easily look back and remember a time when they thought they

“knew it all.”

It’s a truly odd quirk of getting older and, hopefully, a bit wiser: You eventually realize that the older you get the less you know. If all goes well, you become a better listener because you realize that listening is a key path to understanding. You become more open-minded because you have been proven wrong a time or two and have accepted that you are not infallible. You

Please see AWAKENING, Page 11 each other, share secrets, laugh and giggle, or most importantly as we approached puberty, fix our hair, which later led to the use of hair spray, or experiment with a touch of lipstick (gasp!). And there was gossip and of course some tears. And comfort would be given to dry the tears. No adults intruded on us that I can remember. And when we were ready to return to our class and our desk no questions were asked. And the years passed as we grew into young ladies. We grew in understanding of our changing lives and new issues, knowing we had our own private space at school where privacy was respected and provided, just as in the larger world which we were about to enter. We all knew we could expect that with certainty.