The Enterprise editorial staff apparently misinterpreted the sarcasm of my letter that was published in the Oct. 18 edition of the paper. I say this because they decided to put the title, "A cynic's view of Park Rapids," over my letter. My letter was far from being cynical. In fact, it is probably the most positive of all letters written regarding the upcoming levy referendum.
I wrote my letter thinking that the sarcasm was obviously apparent. I guess it wasn't. To clarify my points... There are church choirs and private music instructors in town. There are places for kids to play sports outside of school. Businesses hire students, the hospital and the nursing home love to have volunteers, and the Boy Scouts, Girl Scouts and 4-H are all active organizations within the community. In other words, there are many opportunities for kids outside of school activities!
I also wrote a comment about all of the kids who were doing things on Saturday night. Again I used sarcasm with the idea that it would be apparent. It's not good that kids are involved in underage drinking and other various illegal and immoral activities. The point of my comment is that even with school activities young people still do these things. The idea that just because young people participate in sports or music or the play means that they aren't going to do those things is just naive. From my experience in high school, as well as being a parent, the greatest influence on a kid making sound moral decisions is not his participation in school activities, but the influence of his parents.
If the Enterprise wants to declare any letter as cynical I would suggest it label those written by people who claim that Park Rapids is going to turn into some teenage wasteland because they won't have school activities to participate in. Thinking like that implies that Park Rapids is not a vibrant community but one that is simply a product of its school. To me that is extremely cynical and sad.
Rick Hensel
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Red Lake Falls
