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This Saturday, I had the pleasure of spending my afternoon observing the power our community has when it bands together for a good cause.

In Dowagiac, I was on site taking photos as a long line of cars weaved from Dailey Road to Peavine Street to wish a young boy diagnosed with cancer a happy birthday. It was clear that not every driver in the line knew the boy, Weski Wesaw, but they were there anyway, honking their horns and waving out their windows to him. They might not have known Weski personally, but they knew a community member needed them to show up, so they did.

I can’t tell you how much it warmed my heart to see the community come together like this — all to make a child smile.

In my time working at Leader Publications, I have seen nearly countless examples of what the community is capable of when it comes together in the name of positivity. It happens all the time.  Heck, Weski’s birthday celebration was not even the only example from Saturday. Later that evening, the Sister Lakes community came together to run laps around Crooked Lake in celebration of a couple’s 50th wedding anniversary. The same day, my morning was filled watching tractor drivers from across Cass County ride to raise funds for cancer patients.

Seeing these events reminded me of the power our communities can have when we come together.

Right now, our country is in a place of division. It seems as though every difference of opinion pushes us further away from each other. Every discussion is treated as a fight rather than an opportunity to understand each other better. Just a scroll through your Facebook feed is enough to convince you that we are too far gone, that there is nothing that could unite us.

However, on Saturday, people from all different backgrounds, political affiliations and geographic areas came together to spread positivity in our communities. It was a reminder of what we can do when we stop thinking of ourselves and start thinking of the community as a whole.

It was truly an incredible sight to see, and it certainly challenged me to not only look for the positivity in the community but to actively create it. If enough of us feel called to rise to that challenge, I believe southwest Michigan can be an example to the rest of the country about how powerful a community can be. Together, we can be unstoppable.