Homewood Nation

What does Homewood produce?

I asked myself that question this morning, and my thoughts in response led to "I want" questions, like, "What do I WANT Homewood to produce?" and "What do I WANT Homewood to be known for producing?"

And I wrote a sentence that I just realized was me giving myself an instruction, if not a command:

"Make Homewood world-famous for producing entertainment."

For the neighborhood that produced Ahmad Jamal, Billy Strayhorn, John Edgar Wideman and Antoine Fuqua, that may not be as much of a stretch as it sounds like. But it is still a stretch. I wrote a post on my personal blog, "ReVisions," about what that means for me personally. The nub of it is: growing my company, Luminaria Productions, can help to establish Homewood as a hub of entertainment production.

With all that I have done and am doing with the Save Race Street Committee, Block Watch Plus, Operation Better Block, the Homewood Children's Village - with all that, growing Luminaria Productions may be the best and most important thing I can do for Homewod.

Block Watch Plus has a residents-only meeting tonight at 6 in the South Conference Room of the Homewood-Brushton YMCA. I will ask everyone there to say what they want for Homewood. Tomorrow, I will share some of the responses.

In asking that type of question of a group before, I have tended to forget to give my own answer. So in case I don't chime in tonight, I'll give it here, now.

I want Homewood to be beautiful, prosperous, safe, green, connected, global and really, really smart - and world-famous as the home of Luminaria Productions, which produces entertainment that moves the world.

What do you want Homewood to produce? What do you want Homewood to be famous for producing?