With a great burst of new year optimism, the BHCA Greening Committee is calling attention to a wide array of 2021 outdoor activities for neighborhood parks, along with a new map that pinpoints where each park is located. The mapmaker is Greg Baranoski, who also is a volunteer helping to maintain Douglas K. Morrison Park.
The calendar, admittedly aspirational at the earlier dates, assumes that COVID-19 is sufficiently under control to allow properly spaced participation in outdoor events, beginning with – maybe – a sock burning celebrating the vernal equinox, AKA the arrival of spring, on March 20. This symbolic goodbye to cold weather is part of a maritime celebration that, according to Preservation Maryland, originated in Annapolis in 1978.
Boat builders, sailors and watermen who were sick of a long, cold winter that kept them off the water were said to have built a bonfire and thrown in their socks, vowing not to wear them again until it once again became too cold to go on the water. The Eastport Yacht Club and the Annapolis Maritime Museum observe this tradition and, with the assistance of social media, sock burning has caught fire across the country — even in land-locked areas. In Annapolis, however, last year’s celebration was cancelled because of the pandemic. That may also happen, here and there, this March.
The Committee is working with Antoinette Peele of the Madison Park Improvement Association and others to develop Arts-in-the-Parks programs. The Greening Committee prepared this calendar of events for 2021:
March 20 (tentative) Sock Burning; March Equinox Contee-Parago Triangle Park
April 4 Easter Egg Hunt Rutter’s Mill Park
May TBD Spring Soiree John Street Park
May 9 Mother’s Day Pot-Luck Rutter’s Mill Park
May 15 50th Anniversary Fete and Program Contee-Parago Triangle Park
June 5 Boltonstock Arnold Sumpter Park
July 16-18 Artscape Mount Royal Medians
September 24 F. Scott Fitzgerald Birthday F. Scott Fitzgerald Park
October 31 Pumpkin Glow Johns Street Park
October 31 Masked Pumpkin Parade Arnold Sumpter Park
November 11 Veterans Remembrance Day Congressional Medal of Honor Park
December Holiday Lights Display Johns Street Park
–Lee Tawney
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