A Berkshire Edge reporter asked me, what would Former Selectman* Mary Flynn have said about Desisto? I think the reporter meant, what outcome would Mary have wanted, but you know, Mary’s focus might have been elsewhere. Not as much on the final decision as on how we reached it.

First, Miss Mary was a conservationist. She worked tirelessly to preserve the land at the southern entrance to Stockbridge. She preserved Gould Meadows, the connection to Bullard woods, and she, not a wealthy woman by any measure, placed a Conservation Restriction (CR) on a piece of land she inherited, and donated it. She could have sold it and lived more comfortably. She did not. She would have told us that how we spend our money is how we express our values.

She regretted that she could not talk Mike DeSisto into a CR on Yokun Ridge, in fact, on the whole mountain side. She would have been thrilled to secure it and impressed that Patrick Sheehan would give over control of 2/3 of property he owns — control over 200 of 300 acres. One note: a CR is forever or until a vote of the legislature of the Commonwealth permits its removal.

After that, Mary Flynn would have cared about us. She would have wanted us to argue our points in good parliamentarian fashion — best rules of debate — without ad hominem attacks and without false arguments cooked up to divert or delay. Actually, she would have done more than that, if we went astray, she would have intervened. If folks offered more heat than light, she would have smoothed it over, “Now Darlin’, we all heard you, but let’s move along.” If worst of all, anyone tried to use scare-politics, she would have stomped her foot in her best schoolteacher manner and called for quiet. She would want us to fight fair, accept the result whatever it was, and greet one another at the post office.

Mary may or may not have voted for the development. She may or may not have believed that Stockbridge could survive Mr. Sheehan’s development, but she would have believed absolutely that Stockbridge could not survive bad blood, false flags, and ill will.

• Yup that is what Mary wanted to be called —