Starling and Solstice: The Story Behind the Names

This summer, as hope began to take root and our dream of creating supportive housing was finally becoming reality, I began thinking about what to call our two new campuses.

I wanted names that could each stand on their own, no story required. But I also wanted the names to carry a conviction. Something that could carry the whole soul of this work, if you took the time to ask why.

Our organization’s name, Greater Des Moines Supportive Housing, isn’t going anywhere. This is an addition to who we are, not a replacement. But these two buildings needed names of their own.

So, I’m excited to introduce…

Starling, in West Des Moines.

Solstice, in Urbandale.

Here is the story behind the names.

Planting the Seed

I want to start in a particular place.

Prairiewoods. Hiawatha, Iowa. A Franciscan retreat center at the edge of the city where the land opens up and something in you gets quiet enough to hear yourself think.

Almost five years ago, when Greater Des Moines Supportive Housing was just a dream that I didn’t know how to make real, I went there with friends and co-founders Carol and Sarah. After a day hiking in the woods and walking the labyrinth, we stayed up late. We ate popcorn while we hoped out loud. And somewhere in that night, something was unleashed. All the ideas. All the possibility. We looked at each other and realized… this could be real.

The morning we were leaving, we met Sister Nancy. An octogenarian and one of the founding sisters of that place. She heard what we were trying to build and she believed in us immediately. She helped find resources. And she told us we had enough energy to power a submarine around the world.

That’s where this began. In a sacred pause. In a place where the ground holds you still long enough to find out what you’re actually called to do.

And somewhere in that night, this idea planted a seed. Gregory Boyle, who has spent decades walking alongside people that society has discarded, calls it kinship. He writes about a circle of compassion and no one standing outside of it. He writes about moving toward the margins until the margins themselves are erased. About standing with the demonized so that the demonizing will stop. About situating ourselves right next to the disposable so that the day will come when we stop throwing people away.

A Belonging Project

The why behind this work has always been belonging and becoming. You can’t have one without the other. To become who you’re meant to be, you have to belong somewhere safe enough to be your authentic self. Not the version that has to strive or prove. The genuine version that just… awakens.

Jeremy, one of our board members, has always called this a “belonging project.” Not a housing project. A belonging project.

I think of Don*, one of my former residents. He made sure everyone around him knew they belonged. At his memorial service, one of his neighbors, who only met him at that housing campus, told us that Don was the only person he ever remembers telling him that he loved him.

I think of Aaron*, another resident. Who transformed so completely that when we wrote a resident spotlight about him, he asked with tears in his eyes if he could have a copy to send to his mom. So she could see that someone cared. That he had people. That he was becoming.

When someone belongs somewhere safe for the first time, they surprise themselves. They get their sparkle back. And once you have one moment where you exceed your own expectations… you start to want the next thing. You start to believe you are someone who gets to have a next thing.

That is belonging and becoming. Living in the same house.

The Whole Flock Carries Each Bird

Did you know that when starlings fly together… hundreds, sometimes thousands of them… there is no leader? Each bird watches its seven nearest neighbors and responds. That’s it. And from that simple act of attention, of truly seeing the ones beside you, together they create something breathtaking that none of them could be alone.

Starlings are not majestic birds. Small. Common. Often overlooked. Unremarkable on their own.

And yet.

No bird carries the whole flock. The whole flock carries each bird.

The murmuration has no margins. No bird on the outside looking in. The circle keeps widening, always including, always moving together. That is kinship made visible.

The Moment Light Begins to Return

And then there is the winter solstice. December 21st. The longest night of the year. The moment of maximum darkness.

And also… the exact moment the light begins to return.

Not because anything has been fixed. Not because winter is over. February is still brutal. And yet, the light is coming back. One minute at a time. Imperceptibly at first. But turning.

Jim, a board member and co-founder, who has believed in this vision unconditionally from the beginning, once shared something that has stayed with me. He talked about how every act of creation starts in the same place: a formless, empty void. Without shelter. Without walls. And then, out of nothing… something. He said that’s what we’re doing. Building something out of void. That if we just kept solving one problem, then the next, we would get to build a place that allows people to come home.

That’s where the solstice lives too. The deepest dark. And yet, the exact moment something new begins. The light returning out of nothing.

Newgrange in Ireland is five thousand years old. A passage tomb built so that once a year, on winter solstice morning, a single shaft of light travels sixty feet down a dark corridor and illuminates the chamber within. Ancient people built an entire monument around that one moment. Because they knew that the light finding its way into the darkest place is worth marking.

Solstice is not rescue. It’s not a fix. It’s a threshold. The moment a person stops moving away from the light and begins… even without knowing it… moving toward it.

Your light was never extinguished. It was just the longest night. And now.

Building the Circle

All of it has been pointing here. To two buildings that will be home to hundreds of people over the years. People who need somewhere real and safe to belong. People who are ready, even if they don’t know it yet, to become.

Starling says you are not alone. Pay attention to your neighbors and something extraordinary becomes possible.

Solstice says this is your turning point. You don’t have to be healed to begin. Just arrive.

Belonging and becoming.

We’ve had the blueprint all along. And now we are ready to build the circle.

Our buildings are aptly named.

Starling and Solstice.

Thank you for reading this far, and for caring why.

Emily Osweiler, MSW
CEO, Greater Des Moines Supportive Housing

*Names have been changed to protect identities.