Transition Hendersonville - Black Bear Coffee Company Cafe

God Created Heaven and Earth. It is our responsibility to honor, protect and preserve it.

A community that speaks, a community that listens, a community that shares it's concerns and a community that cares about solutions. Simon and Garfunkel once sang "They've all come to look for America" and tonight I felt that I found it, the heart of America, right here.

Just a few decades ago at the corner of McDougle and Bleeker NYC. The Cafe Wha?, The Gaslight and The Bitter End, The Village Voice of a generation honored peace, love, happiness and hope for equality in a better and stronger America. A generation that believed In God We Trust as well as the power of human compassion and kindness. That power is still believed and still generated by those who come together to share it with others at the Black Bear Coffee Co Espresso Bar and Cafe. Tonight was a very special night for us. The food, delicious, the coffee, sublime, but the positive energy of all the people participating in Transition Hendersonville felt like the convergence of the optimism and idealism that fueled my youth and gave direction and purpose to my life. It is so good to know in my sixties, that the best of the 60's still survives and thrives in sacred corners of our world. Conservation: To preserve and conserve our environment so that our children and our children's children can breathe clean air and drink clean water. Tonight, through the poetry of words and music, that idealism is still alive and well. Tonight, there were many village voices, each equally earnest and articulate in their message. Yet tonight, one voice seemed to capture the essence of the evening. She sang with the voice of an angel still timid with her wings still untested yet yearning and compelled to fly. As the evening progressed her voice grew stronger but it's message remained pure and true. Age has it's privileges. My years allow me to look back. I can say I was there when the Beatles first took the stage at the Ed Sullivan Theater. I was there when James Taylor introduced a rather stage awkward songwriter Carole King and someday I will say I was there when Sarah sang out her heart to us at the Black Bear Coffee Cafe. Her lyrics floated on a soft melodic stream of conscience that captured and revealed her observations and feelings in those most meaningful moments of her life. Her insights were pointedly mature and congealed in a unique series of chords and harmonies that drew in my attention and made me want to stay and hear more. She captivated her audience this evening and I believe this is only the beginning of a meaningful career.

Truth is both relative and absolute, temporal and eternal. The artist, the poet, the musician all seem to somehow feel the truth deeper than the rest of us. They seem to know the truth truer than the rest of us and in their moment of inspiration they capture the truth and try show it to the rest of us who are open and willing will see. Tonight I was listening and I say thank you. Thank you to Diane and the others who fostered Transition Hendersonville, thank you to the scientists who study, the environmentalists who preserve, the artists who capture and communicate. And Thank you to The Black Bear for being such gracious hosts. Much more than a coffee house, you are a family and a coffee home.