What kind of neighborhood did y’all live in when you were growing up? Think about that for a minute, and then consider where you live now. Is it the same? Does it have the same “feel?” Mine doesn’t. I’ve been pondering the differences this morning as I thought about two different subjects.
One of those subjects is “Why I Blog.” I wanted to write about that for the Carnival of Circular Communication, which has the theme “blogging” on this go-round. The other subject is the word “miss,” which is the theme for It’s A Blog Eat Blog World‘s series called Manic Monday. I decided to kill two birds with one stone.
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I miss living in a “neighborhood.” Don’t get me wrong, I have friends and I’m a part of several organizations. That’s not what I miss. I miss having “neighborly” people living around me. I miss a sense of community in a world where people tend to isolate themselves inside their homes.
I grew up living in 50s tract housing in a small town. The houses were small and packed closely together, with relatively small yards (unless you were mowing them, and then they seemed huge). There were no high privacy fences in the back yards; the most anyone had was a chain link fence to keep the dogs inside. Sidewalks wound their way from house to house connecting them like a huge “dot to dot” picture.
Everyone knew everyone else’s business, and that was good. We were neighbors, and we took care of each other. If someone got sick, a neighbor was sure to drop by to offer help. If there was a death in the family, neighbors brought food. If your child was getting “out of line,” a neighbor told you about it before your child had a chance to get into real trouble.
Image may be NSFW.
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At any time of day, you could see your neighbors in the yard. Grown ups mowed the grass and weeded the gardens. Children rode their bicycles in the streets, skated down the sidewalk or played hopscotch on the driveways. Sometimes, people just sat in their lawnchairs on the yard in the evenings. When they barbecued in the back yard, they might call over the fence for the neighbors to bring some hamburgers for the grill and join them. Always, if you saw your neighbor, you waved and called out to them. More often than not, you went over to actually chat with them for a few minutes to exchange the latest news. The neighborhood felt alive.
The neighborhood where I live now is not like that at all. Oh, you might see people outside in the early mornings or late evening. They walk their dogs (so the dogs will leave the “mess” in your yard and not their own!). Children don’t play outside, at least not in the front yard, for there are no sidewalks on which to play. Instead, if they go outside at all, they are in their swimming pools behind a high wooden fence.
Drive through my neighborhood in mid-day, and you will think that no one lives in those big houses. You won’t see a soul, unless the lawn services are out mowing.
I know the names of the people who live on either side of me, but that is only because I walked over to introduce myself to them when I moved my house five years ago. They certainly didn’t step over to welcome me into the neighborhood.
A young couple moved in two doors down just after I moved here. Knowing that my other neighbors would do nothing to welcome them, I decided to greet them and tell them I was glad they were here. She was from up North and he was from Germany. I didn’t want them to think Texans were unfriendly, so I decided to give them the traditional housewarming gifts that my Mamaw might have given a new neighbor.
I took them a brand new broom (to sweep out the “old troubles”), a loaf of fancy bread from our finest bakery in town (to symbolize that I hoped they would always have “plenty”), and a lantana plant for her garden (since she was a gardener and was interested in plants that were from Texas). They were “unconventional” housewarming gifts, but they got my point across. Though she is young enough to be my daughter (and her baby is almost the granddaughter I might never have), that neighbor and I are fast friends.
You can see that this is not the neighborhood I remember from my youth. I’ve been wondering why it’s so different. Is it because, with the advent of central air conditioning, people don’t go out in the Texas heat? Do children not come outside to play because they have 100 television stations to watch? Are we just too busy to take the time to know our neighbors? Is it because people are so “transient” that they don’t want to develop relationships when they might move in a couple of years? Or, do we just not care anymore? Is it something I said? Are your neighborhoods like that, or is it just mine?
I don’t have a clue. But, I miss being part of a “neighborhood.” That is why I blog.
I know that I can go on-line and share my news, and that my blogging neighbors will drop by to chat. I can go to “their house” and talk. We can remain “neighbors” or become friends. While my blogging buddies won’t be able to pick up my child at school if I am too sick to move, they will jump at the chance to help in any way they can.
Recently, my friend Nigel asked me to drop by to visit one of his readers to give her some encouragement. He didn’t know that woman, except for on-line visits, yet he was neighborly enough to want to help. When I decided to try a wild and crazy dream for charity many people, bloggers and non-bloggers alike, jumped to help. Many people have written about it on their own blogs, and my friend Marcia even wrote a wonderful incentive for anyone to help with Share A Square. Those people out there that I might never meet face to face are acting just like neighbors!
My next door neighbors might not be overly friendly, but my global neighbors more than make up for that. Blogging makes me feel as if I am part of a neighborhood. Theinternet unites us.
Hey wait a minute! I guess I have to amend my statement. How can I miss living in a neighborhood? I do live in a blogging neighborhood, and I wouldn’t trade it for all the tea in China.
So, about that “missing?”
Never mind.
© Shelly for This Eclectic Life, 2007. |
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Post tags: All Things "Blogging", blogging community, Carnival of Circular Communications, Manic Monday
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