Saving our treasures

"Nadie sabe lo que vale el aqua hasta que falta." I bet you didn't know Ms V was bilingual. I know enough Spanish to be dangerous. The literal translation of that sentence doesn't make sense in English, but in essence it means "you don't know what you have until it's gone". One of the greatest treasures in Ward 7 is the Fort Dupont Ice Arena.

I'm in the Big Brother/Big Sister Program and I've taken my Little Sister and her friend there several times. It is the ONLY indoor ice skating arena inside of the District. When I spent my Saturday mornings working out at Fort Dupont Park, I would chuckle at the irony of Northern Virginia parents (read: white people) having to come to East of the River (read: black neighborhood) so their kids could play hockey (read: traditionally a white sport).

According to the Washington Post, the lack of funding could force the arena to temporarily close its doors. They need to come up with $250,000 by May to keep all the programs running. If they can't come up the money, the worse case scenario is they have to close for the summer. Maybe the Washington Post article will pull at the heart strings of someone with deep pockets and inspire them to donate some money.

I hope everything works out for them. My Little Sister really likes going their and it's a cheap activity (less than $20 for both of us). Plus the programming allows black children to be exposed traditionally non-black sports like ice hockey and figure skating.