Parks and Rec is going to leave a huge, Leslie Knope scrapbook-sized hole in your life. While you can never replace what Pawnee has given you over the last few years, here are some ways you can get that Pawnee love in real life.
JJ’s Diner
Sometimes this was all that Leslie and Ron had in common: a love of delicious breakfast food. But JJ’s, like all of Pawnee, is gone. Luckily, if you live in almost any American city or town, there’s a JJ’s-like diner just down the street. Become a regular, go at least once a week. The benefits if you do that are: You get delicious food, you build a community of like-minded breakfast lovers, and your breakfast experience won’t be canceled by the people who run NBC like Ron and Leslie’s was*.
Scrapbooks
Leslie had deep love of all things scrapbooked, but really it was rooted in a deep love of memories and organization. She seems like someone who had never discovered that Facebook can keep all of your photos in neat little photo albums online. But really, wouldn’t we all be a little better if we didn’t know as much about Facebook as we do? Get your best photos from your most recent vacation printed out and put them in an old school photo album. We are willing to bet that it will be the vacation you discuss the most with your friends when they come over next time.
Friendships
At the end of the day, Parks and Rec was always about relationships. We saw every main character finally find love, even Tom Haverford. We aren’t saying that you need to go out and marry the first person you meet, but we are saying to invest in the people around you. Even Ron, who always had a façade of dislike towards his coworkers was devastated when his friends left the Parks Department. He was never the same until he finally fessed up to his feelings about his true friends and got back in everyone’s good graces. So, fill that hole in your life by investing in those around you: at work, school, church, bowling league, the diner that you will begin frequenting…Everywhere! Besides, good friendships will last much longer than any TV show, especially one with NBC at the helm.
*Personal story: my roommates and I wanted to become regulars at the local diner down the street. It was awesome, it had been around for about 40 years. We went a couple of times and loved it. Then one day, it was reported in the news that it was closing for good. We were devastated even though we had only been twice. On the final day it was open, we rushed from church over to the diner for a final meal…and they had sold out of food. So many people came out to support that they were done by 11 am. So, yeah, sometimes they do get canceled like a good NBC comedy.
Scott Bedgood 