Some friendships are lifelong, while others are but brief moments in our timeline of life. Little did we know that the latter is how it was to be when I met Kevin Hinckley, just 6 ½ months ago. Kevin Hinckley lived from October 17, 1958 to the day of his sudden death on October 21, 2011. All who knew and loved Kevin agree that he squeezed a lot of worthwhile living in between, and we are glad to have shared some days on earth with such a lover of God's green earth.

Before being introduced to him, I was told that Kevin was a local mover-and-shaker. He was our key to becoming sincerely involved with our Kops Park community. After making a few connections by telephone, we met in person on Saturday, March 26, at the Auer Garden Spring Clean-up. A crowd of 2 1/2 showed up to begin spring pruning that day: Kevin, showed, as did I, plus the "1/2" was my collie Strider. The lack of attendance that day was undaunting to Kevin. We worked and chatted intermittently until it began snowing. "Snowing!?!" I thought to myself, who would keep gardening in the snow when it wasn't even their yard? Looking back, I smile and say, "Kevin, of course." The first photo I took was of Kevin reaching down to show off some plants. (That photo is on our home page.) He was in his element.

Kevin was the quintessential teacher of living green. The levels of learning he introduced to the students of Milwaukee School of Languages crossed many disciplines. From botany to biology to art and social studies and even the social graces, Kevin was a master at conducting these into single-focus activities. He connected students and teachers to work in an outdoor classroom with prairie plants and trees indigenous to our native Wisconsin. Through cooperation, he was able to get middle school students to shed their age-appropriate apathy and dig Auer Garden. Much the way a proud parent sports their brag book, Kevin often showed off his Auer Garden photo album -- his pride and joy. It spotlights the step-by-step progress made over several years to plant and care for the prairie plants in the garden. His "aha!" moment activities gave students and Kops Park neighbors alike the realization that one person, a few people and even an entire neighborhood can, indeed, make a difference in this world.

Kevin was your basic grassroots agent for change. He thought nothing of calling our alderman Jim Bohl or other City, County and Parks and Rec representatives to "just ask and see what can be done." Having grown up in the neighborhood, Kevin believed in fostering cooperation throughout a community. It was only natural that he would return home in recent years to care for his mother Margaret, a WWII war bride from England who had settled in the neighborhood and remained there until her recent death in July of this year. Margaret loved her garden, and there is no doubt that her love of gardening was transplanted in Kevin as he grew to love Earth Day and Arbor Day as well.

Sure, Kevin worked with local folks to see that Kops Park remained green and healthy. His viewpoint on what included good health for the area reflected back to his own childhood in the 1960s. He worked with city officials to take steps that would deter loitering at Kops Park. He was often quoted saying, "I'm not turning the neighborhood of my youth over to people who don't mean well. I really do believe that 'an active neighborhood is a safe neighborhood' " -- the  slogan for the Kops Park Neighborhood Association.

He was in awe – as were we here at Beautiful Savior – at the success of the first annual Kops Park Patriotic Parade this past June. He beamed for days – as did we -- because of the 150-strong turnout for neighborhood kids, dogs and their people. Nothing was more important to Kevin than turning over experiences from the ’60s and ‘70s to our Kops Park kids of today. Sure, there are technological advances that are great experiences for today’s kids. However, Kevin often said things like, “You just can’t replace the special times a family shares in person when the video games are finally shut off." Things like gardening and studying local history and plain old yard work  all made for very rich conversations between neighbors. Kevin wanted very much to share that joy and connection between the families of Kops Park.

(Join us for the next blog as we learn of Kevin's accomplishments in the community of greater Lodi, Wisconsin.)