Under the baobab: Happy Valley comes together through sports, events aimed at helping neighbors

“Now we turn our thoughts to the Creator, or Great Spirit, and send greetings and thanks for all the gifts of Creation. Everything we need to live a good life is here on this Mother Earth. For all the love that is still around us, we gather our minds together as one and send our choicest words of greetings and thanks to the Creator. Now our minds are one.” — Haudenosaunee Thanksgiving address

Congrats to Penn State football coach James Franklin and our No. 4 nationally ranked football team for finding the grit for a come back to win on the road in Minnesota. If they win their final home game against unranked Maryland, they are a shoo-in to make the College Football Playoffs.

Speaking of grit, coach Carolyn Kieger and the unbeaten Lady Lions came back to win in overtime against Drexel at the Bryce Jordan Center, setting a school record with their 17th consecutive nonconference home court win. Center Grace Merkle set a personal best with 31 points. She remains among the top five in scoring and rebounding in the Big Ten. Gabby Elliot scored her first double-double of her career with 16 points and 10 rebounds.

Our nationally ranked No. 4 women’s volleyball team met the No. 2 ranked Nebraska Huskers at sold-out Rec Hall. Coach Katie Schumacher-Cawley and the team have won 19 straight home matches. If the 28-2 women’s volleyball defeat the 28-1 Huskers they will secure a minimum of a tie for the Big Ten Championship. Gillian Grimes was named Big Ten defensive player of the week and Izzy Starck was chosen as setter of the week.

Head coach Cael Sanderson and the Nittany Lion wrestling team roared to a 41-2 season opener over Drexel at Rec Hall. Last Sunday, the national champions won nine out of ten individual titles at the Black Knights Invitational held at West Point. And Penn State’s fourth-seeded women’s soccer team will play second seeded North Carolina in the national quarter finals.

Happy Thanksgiving and Indigenous Peoples’ mourning day. This year we went to the holiday buffet at the newly re-opened Nittany Lion Inn. The food and the service were excellent, and there were no dishes to wash. There were a couple of hundred folks who turned out including Penn State President Neeli Bendapudi and her extended family.

And last week, nearly 400 attended Centre County United Way’s Taste of the Town fundraiser at the Penn Stater Hotel & Conference Center. Forty area restaurants served specialty items, ranging from appetizers to desserts. This annual event helps raise money to assist our neighbors who need a leg up. The theme was ALICE, which stands for Asset Limited, Income Constrained, Employed. ALICE are hardworking members of the community who earn above the federal poverty level, yet do not earn enough to afford a bare-bones household budget, or “household survival budget.” In Centre County, there are 60,467 households — 30% are ALICE households and 17% are living in poverty. This means that 47% of our Centre County neighbors are struggling to afford basic needs living. Neither political party adequately addressed that issue in the last election.

The President-elect seemingly surrounds himself with cronies selected on the basis of their personal loyalty. The rest of us still seek remedies to the real problems we face: global warming, health care, human rights, education, child care generally, national and international corruption and equitable resource distribution. It is not sustainable that less than 1% of the world’s wealthiest people dictate the use of 50% of the world’s resources. While some of us agonize over rising rents and mortgages, others spend billions arranging to have a 10-minute weightless walk-in-space.

Whether you are celebrating or mourning the results of the last presidential election, remember that in a democracy, politics is basically local. We the people must open the silo doors and assemble together in community in order to restore the soul of our nation.