By DEBERA CARLTON HARRELL
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER REPORTER

Redmond's roots help keep it grounded despite all the change. While certain areas -- southeast Redmond, Overlake (where Microsoft is located) and the Willows Road high-tech corridor -- host increasing commercial development, downtown Redmond and many of its neighborhoods have kept a small-town feel.

Walk downtown, where a feed store's grain towers are taller than surrounding two-story brick buildings, and you sense an easy-going civic familiarity.

A restaurant sends extra food ("a free lunch") to a business across the street. Waitresses and merchants are friendly. Neighbors help neighbors. People know each other, stopping on sidewalks to chat or waving as friends drive by.

An elderly gentleman waited at the local feed store, De Young's T&D Feeds, to thank an employee for the tip on weed killer.

"It killed those blackberry bushes really dead," the grateful gent says.

Tom Bauer, the advice-giving employee, says Redmond is changing but still has common courtesies and community traditions. The Redmond High School marching band, for example, practices by meandering through neighborhoods on so-called Education Hill, where many schools are located. Neighborhood kids follow the band "like the Pied Piper," Bauer says.

"Redmond is very family-oriented," Bauer says, noting the strong Lake Washington School District and recreational facilities such as baseball and soccer fields.

Ann Nugent, who works on a privately owned farm feeding horses, gardening, hauling hay and "shoveling horse poop," calls Redmond "very generous." As a volunteer fund-raiser for Canine Companions, a group that trains dogs to help wheelchair users, Nugent vowed to name one of the trainee dogs "Redmond" if she meets her goal of $500.

"I think most of Redmond is very, very friendly, although I worry that the mall is going to change Redmond forever," Nugent says. "It used to be you could breeze through town. Redmond has its roots in agriculture, and it's becoming less and less rural, which makes me sad. It's not what it used to be -- not as quaint."

Sandy Paulson, a 16-year resident who works at Big Time Pizzeria, remembers how quiet and slow Redmond once was.

"People are a lot more in a rush, it seems to me," says Paulson, who loves walking and flying kites with her husband and two children along the river or in Marymoor Park. But like other young couples with children, Paulson, 25, is concerned about the lack of affordable housing as home prices in the popular area rise.

Yet humor, tolerance and a can-do attitude have not yet given way to what some called "Seattle intensity, hustle and bustle."

Linda Harrison, who works at the Stonehouse Bookstore and Spiritual Growth Center, did not bat an eye when two youths dressed in black came in asking for a book on "how to film auras."

"Redmond is a little bit of everything," Harrison says. "And what I see is that the more fast-paced people's lives become, the more they look for ways to lower stress, keep their balance and find more meaning in their lives."

Continued:

• This high-tech town has deep roots in agriculture
• Feelings strong for rural identity