I live in a small rural town that connects to the Canadian border. It is an area where the old adage of, “neighbor helping neighbor,” still exists, and I am proud to call Bonners Ferry home. Designated the “Friendliest Town in Idaho,” for the past six years and counting, it is a place where the people never hesitate to step up and offer help to those around them.
As a former journalist and managing editor of the County newspaper, I have personally witnessed how neighbors and friends reach out financially to families with children who require a medically necessary surgery. These same people a short time later came forward to offer financial, material, emotional, and physical support to help a family rebuild their home after losing everything in a fire. They bothered to take the time during a severe windstorm to cutup a tree that was blocking the middle of the road preventing vehicles to pass in either direction while other trees posed a threat of falling on top of them.
Bonners Ferry is a community that will take the necessary steps to help anyone in need, regardless of your race, color or ethnic origin, and they do so do so without an ulterior motive, expectation or desire for anything in return.
After decades of traveling and living in different regions of the United States, I have seen how the rudeness of people throughout our country continues to grow on our highways and in our towns. I have lived in some of the southern areas of the country where the strongest racist attitudes between blacks and whites still exist.
I admit, when I moved here 10 years ago, I was concerned about living close to an active white supremacist group that took racism to the extreme. This was not racism dedicated solely to the color of your skin, but encompassed anyone of a different ethnic origin, such as Indian, Hispanic, Jewish, etc.
In the beginning, I was afraid to drive on the back roads or other remote areas because I believed the media hype about running into people with guns and getting shot for trespassing. The last thing I expected to find was a place I would want to call home. A place where community was more than a word, it was a way of life.
Nor would I have ever imagined that I would someday own a home just below Ruby Ridge...the area where Randy Weaver lost his wife and son during the standoff with federal agents in the early 1990s. This is just another amazing facet to this community. Despite how hard it was for the people living here to overcome the devastation of the events that unfolded during Ruby Ridge, they continue to reach out to newcomers without hesitation.
Moving to Boundary County has inspired a sense of coming home while renewing and deepening my faith in people. This community is a perfect illustration of the dreams our ancestors had during the early years of America's birth, and how that spirit continues to grow in some regions of this wonderful country.