A sign of virtue

The story behind that one-word sign on Healdsburg Avenue

The 100th virtue posted on a sign in front a house on Healdsburg Avenue. (Photo by Rei Blaser)

Ever wonder about that large, hand-lettered sign in the front yard of a house on Healdsburg Avenue, between DuFranc and Lyding? Every two weeks or so, the sign features another new word denoting a virtue, like honesty, caring, humility, etc.

For the last four years, the residents at that house on Healdsburg Avenue have been posting a virtuous word in their front yard, and for almost as long, I’ve been bugging them to tell me about this quixotic venture. And always, they demurred.

So I was thrilled earlier this week to get a message from one of the sign makers—former City Councilmember and bootmaker Michael Carnacchi—announcing that now that he and his wife Rei Blaser had posted their 100th word, they were at last ready to talk.

I sat down with them in their sunny kitchen, over tiny, brightly colored cups of steaming espresso, and learned about the story behind the sign.

All of the words they’ve posted thus far come from a card deck called Virtues Reflection Cards. The first word they posted four years ago on Thanksgiving was, appropriately, “Thankfulness.”

The Virtues Reflection Cards deck. (Photo by Laura Hagar Rush)

For the first year or so, they chose the cards themselves. “Then we just started asking our friends and our family when they were visiting to choose a card,” Carnacchi said.

Early on, former Sebastopol Library branch manager Mathew Rose suggested the word “Gratitude.” Sonoma County Sheriff Eddie Ingram chose “Service.” When they offered me a chance to choose a card, I chose “Perseverance.”

Their 100th word—Dignity—was chosen by Governor Gavin Newsom, whom Carnacchi recently met up with in Sacramento and told about his sign project.

The shortest word they’ve posted is “Awe,” the longest is “Trustworthiness.”

What’s the philosophy behind this effort?

Carnacchi said he hopes people see the sign and contemplate, even briefly, the role that that virtue plays in their lives and in the life of the community. “The idea is to raise the level of consciousness of the community,” he said. “It’s just a way of countering all the negativity that’s out there. I mean, every crime in our society is a failure of virtue, right?”

There’s a bit of ritual involved in posting the word. Carnacchi and Blaser change the sign out twice a month, on the day of the full moon and new moon. They paint the sign the day before with acrylic paint. If it’s rainy or damp, they put it in a plastic sleeve. After they put up the sign, Blaser reads the word (and the back and front of the card) aloud, sort of introducing it into the atmosphere.

Carnacchi said some people who drive by notice the sign and some people don’t.

“We’ve gotten comments over the years and letters in our mailbox,” he said.

Lawrence Jaffe, head of the Sebastopol Grange, said he takes note of the sign as he drives by. “I definitely discussed the word ‘dignity’ earlier this week as I drove by with a friend on the way to lunch,” Jaffe said.

Carnacchi, an amateur historian, said their virtue project has roots in Benjamin Franklin’s 13 virtues. (See Franklin’s list of virtues at the bottom of this article.) It also has its roots in a program that Blaser started when she was head of the Sebastopol Downtown Association, where all the downtown businesses would put the same single-word affirmation in their windows.

Carnacchi said he’s been interested in the idea of cultivating virtue long before he ran for city council. “We should really do something like that in the schools and kind of teach people because, ideally, that’s what we need: we need to have more virtue, right?”

Now that they’ve run through all 100 virtues in the card deck, they’re not sure what they’re going to do next. Should they just run through the same list again? This is tempting because, even though they’ve given some of their signs away, they’ve still got most of them in a basket in their home office, and painting a new sign every other week is a bit of a hassle.

When the full moon rolled around on Thursday, Dec. 4, they just picked one of the existing signs at random out of the basket, Blaser said.

The word for the next two weeks is “Wonder.”

If you’d like to suggest a virtue not already listed on the poster below or if you have other thoughts on this project, you can reach out to Carnacchi and Blaser here.

Their collection of virtue word signs. (Photo by Laura Hagar Rush)

Here is the full list of virtues that Carnacchi and Blaser posted one by one on their front lawn over the last four years. (Photo from The Virtues Project).

---

Benjamin Franklin’s 13 Virtues

In 1726, when he was only 20 years old, Franklin created a system that he believed would help him develop his character. Here are Benjamin Franklin’s 13 virtues and his commentary on the method he used to put them into practice, as described in his Autobiography:

1. Temperance: Eat not to dullness. Drink not to elevation.

2. Silence: Speak not but what may benefit others or yourself. Avoid trifling conversation.

3. Order: Let all your things have their places. Let each part of your business have its time.

4. Resolution: Resolve to perform what you ought. Perform without fail what you resolve.

5. Frugality: Make no expense but to do good to others or yourself: i.e., Waste nothing.

6. Industry: Lose no time. Be always employed in something useful. Cut off all unnecessary actions.

7. Sincerity: Use no hurtful deceit. Think innocently and justly; and if you speak, speak accordingly.

8. Justice: Wrong none by doing injuries, or omitting the benefits that are your duty.

9. Moderation: Avoid extremes. Forbear resenting injuries so much as you think they deserve.

10. Cleanliness: Tolerate no uncleanness in body, clothes, or habitation.

11. Tranquility: Be not disturbed at trifles, or at accidents common or unavoidable.

12. Chastity: Rarely use venery but for health or offspring; never to dullness, weakness, or the injury of your own or another’s peace or reputation.

13. Humility: Imitate Jesus and Socrates.

My Intention being to acquire the Habitude of all these Virtues, I judg’d it would be well not to distract my Attention by attempting the whole at once, but to fix it on one of them at a time, and when I should be Master of that, then to proceed to another, and so on till I should have gone thro’ the thirteen. And as the previous Acquisition of some might facilitate the Acquisition of certain others, I arrang’d them with that View as they stand above. Temperance first, as it tends to procure that Coolness and Clearness of Head, which is so necessary where constant Vigilance was to be kept up, and Guard maintained, against the unremitting Attraction of ancient Habits, and the Force of perpetual Temptations. This being acquir’d and establish’d, Silence would be more easy, and my Desire being to gain Knowledge at the same time that I improv’d in Virtue, and considering that in Conversation it was obtain’d rather by the use of the Ears than of the Tongue, and therefore wishing to break a Habit I was getting into of Prattling, Punning and Joking, which only made me acceptable to trifling Company, I gave Silence the second Place. This, and the next, Order, I expected would allow me more Time for attending to my Project and my Studies; Resolution, once become habitual, would keep me firm in my Endeavours to obtain all the subsequent Virtues; Frugality and Industry, by freeing me from my remaining Debt, and producing Affluence and Independance, would make more easy the Practice of Sincerity and Justice, &c. &c. Conceiving then that agreable to the Advice of Pythagoras in his Golden Verses daily Examination would be necessary, I contriv’d the following Method for conducting that Examination.

I made a little Book in which I allotted a Page for each of the Virtues. I rul’d each Page with red Ink, so as to have seven Columns, one for each Day of the Week, marking each Column with a Letter for the Day. I cross’d these Columns with thirteen red Lines, marking the Beginning of each Line with the first Letter of one of the Virtues, on which Line and in its proper Column I might mark by a little black Spot every Fault I found upon Examination to have been committed respecting that Virtue upon that Day.

I determined to give a Week’s strict Attention to each of the Virtues successively. Thus in the first Week my great Guard was to avoid every the least Offence against Temperance, leaving the other Virtues to their ordinary Chance, only marking every Evening the Faults of the Day. Thus if in the first Week I could keep my first Line marked T clear of Spots, I suppos’d the Habit of that Virtue so much strengthen’d and its opposite weaken’d, that I might venture extending my Attention to include the next, and for the following Week keep both Lines clear of Spots. Proceeding thus to the last, I could go thro’ a Course compleat in Thirteen Weeks, and four Courses in a Year. And like him who having a Garden to weed, does not attempt to eradicate all the bad Herbs at once, which would exceed his Reach and his Strength, but works on one of the Beds at a time, and having accomplish’d the first proceeds to a Second; so I should have, (I hoped) the encouraging Pleasure of seeing on my Pages the Progress I made in Virtue, by clearing successively my Lines of their Spots, till in the End by a Number of Courses, I should be happy in viewing a clean Book after a thirteen Weeks daily Examination.

My List of Virtues contain’d at first but twelve: But a Quaker Friend having kindly inform’d me that I was generally thought proud; that my Pride show’d itself frequently in Conversation; that I was not content with being in the right when discussing any Point, but was overbearing and rather insolent; of which he convinc’d me by mentioning several Instances; I determined endeavouring to cure myself if I could of this Vice or Folly among the rest, and I added Humility to my List, giving an extensive Meaning to the Word. I cannot boast of much Success in acquiring the Reality of this Virtue; but I had a good deal with regard to the Appearance of it. I made it a Rule to forbear all direct Contradiction to the Sentiments of others, and all positive Assertion of my own. I even forbid myself agreable to the old Laws of our Junto, the Use of every Word or Expression in the Language that imported a fix’d Opinion; such as certainly, undoubtedly, &c. and I adopted instead of them, I conceive, I apprehend, or I imagine a thing to be so or so, or it so appears to me at present. When another asserted something, that I thought an Error, I deny’d my self the Pleasure of contradicting him abruptly, and of showing immediately some Absurdity in his Proposition; and in answering I began by observing that in certain Cases or Circumstances his Opinion would be right, but that in the present case there appear’d or seem’d to me some Difference, &c. I soon found the Advantage of this Change in my Manners. The Conversations I engag’d in went on more pleasantly. The modest way in which I propos’d my Opinions, procur’d them a readier Reception and less Contradiction; I had less Mortification when I was found to be in the wrong, and I more easily prevail’d with others to give up their Mistakes and join with me when I happen’d to be in the right. And this Mode, which I at first put on, with some violence to natural Inclination, became at length so easy and so habitual to me, that perhaps for these Fifty Years past no one has ever heard a dogmatical Expression escape me. And to this Habit (after my Character of Integrity) I think it principally owing, that I had early so much Weight with my Fellow Citizens, when I proposed new Institutions, or Alterations in the old; and so much Influence in public Councils when I became a Member. For I was but a bad Speaker, never eloquent, subject to much Hesitation in my choice of Words, hardly correct in Language, and yet I generally carried my Points.

There are several apps based on Ben Franklin’s 13 virtues. The app, bensvirtues (left), can be found in the app store.

---