We’ve said our goodbye’s to 2024, a year many couldn’t wait to see end. And still, many are dreading the anticipation of the year ahead. I’d like to put both on temporary hold in order to offer gratitude for a few local events and people whose existence positively mattered in the past year. You’ll have yours, and here are some of mine. Kindly note that extremely limited space and word allowance precludes the mention of the hundreds of people, organizations, programs, and services that should be mentioned here.

Here’s to ...

A functional and functioning City Council that has figured out how to collaborate and communicate together for the betterment of our city and our many interdependent relationships. It appears that this group has developed the creativity and cohesion to begin to respond to, if not resolve, fractured and tortured local conflicts with greater equanimity than in the past.

Organizations and programs that have lived out their brief existence to enable, enhance, and teach us how to “listen across the divides”: hats off to The Braver Angels, Hands Across the Hills, and more.

And those organizations and their leaders whose work has become ever more pre-eminent in our city and county, delving deep into issues that impact so many of us. Here’s to Just Roots, and the Stone Soup Café, The Interfaith Council and the Greenfield Public Library, among others.

Those individuals, who, regularly and less frequently, put their passionate beliefs and experiences into print in our local papers through My Turns, opinion pieces, letters, and so much more. We’ve lost a Big One recently in the passing of John Bos. Kudos to you for using your voices for the good of public discourse, no matter which side you were on with any issue.

The ongoing proliferation of open and free events that entertain, engage, and connect us with each other. In so doing, all help to continually redefine the power of community: The annual Harvest Supper, Juneteenth, July Fourth and Halloween parades, Monte’s March, The Festival of Trees, WinterFest Weekend, the City Menorah and the Creche, as well as the plethora of other festive activities, charity walks, and celebrations that support local arts and artists, music and musicians, poets, clowns, athletes, and all the unique members and relationships within our city, no matter our challenges (or perhaps because of them).

Known and less known individuals and organizations who voice, share their agency and urgency, and fight for the rights and needs of others, day by day, especially when those voices have been stilled, quieted, or silent. Thank you and bless you, Randy Kehler!

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Professionals, interns, students, and volunteers who, day in and day out, offer life-giving support, interventions, and therapies to our neighbors in desperate need of them, without concern to ego. They bring hope and inspiration to us all, whether or not we receive directly the fruits of their labors.

Those who do, when and how they can, and those who find other ways, to give back. Whether this occurs through volunteerism, financial donations, committee or commission or board membership, every offering helps our community and county to not only stabilize itself post-COVID, but also to flourish and contiuously reinvent itself.

To those who teach, educate, coach, mentor, and otherwise actively assist our children, friends, and neighbors to learn, to question, to remain curious, and to create. That includes the late Rev. Armand Proulx and just about everyone reading this column.

The many — more and more each month and year — who have stood up, spoken out, and taken the right action in multiple ways to both preserve the natural beauty of our local environs. In so doing, these individuals and organizations lead and support the struggle to make our natural world healthier, freer of contaminants and damage, and slow down the poisons and toxins of environmental degradation.

Somewhere in these paragraphs above — once, twice, thrice, or more — you will find yourself, named or not. And we will find our friends, neighbors, children, parents, cherished adults, and those who lead as well as those who serve (many do both without the need for headlines or appreciation or attention). And all of us have together created a healthier, more hopeful, and stronger community in 2024.

There are no reasons not to continue to build better, stronger, and longer, no matter who runs things beyond the confines of Greenfield, Franklin County, and the Connecticut River Valley in 2025. Let’s take the year ahead and run with it. If it is to be, it is up to us!

Daniel Cantor Yalowitz writes a regular column in the Recorder. A developmental and intercultural psychologist, he has facilitated change in many organizations and communities around the world. His two most recent books are “Journeying with Your Archetypes” and “Reflections on the Nature of Friendship.” Reach out to him at danielcyalowitz@gmail.com.