Posts Tagged ‘community’
Cindy on November 30th, 2009
“Our national myths often exaggerate the role of individual heroes and understate the importance of collective effort.” – Robert Putnam
Taking advantage of the unseasonably warm weather this month, I took a late afternoon bike ride through our subdivision. As I waved at neighbors who were fastening holiday lights to picket fences and evergreen branches, it occurred to me that “community” always tops my annual gratitude list. My family and I have lived in the same neighborhood for more than 20 years, and I can’t think of anywhere else I’d rather be.
I know several people who crave more exotic adventures or like to move to before it’s time to repaint the living room. Americans are highly mobile — and often out of necessity. Our jobs force us to transfer. Or we follow the sun to warmer climates and better economic conditions. But wherever we live, most of us long to live in safe, strong communities where civility is valued and practiced. We want to be neighborly, notes Robert Putnam in Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community.
I couldn’t agree more. I enjoy visiting local diners “where everybody knows your name.” I prefer shopping at the same grocery store and claiming a favorite booth at local restaurants. One of my favorite jobs — though it paid poorly — was writing for my hometown newspaper and meeting readers in line at the post office.
Feeling connected to a community is as essential to me as having food and shelter, and I’m fortunate enough to live in a place where residents are making an effort to meet one another – and where creating a safe haven is a top priority. And it’s not as if my neighbors and I are stuck in a nostalgic time warp. We know from experience that neighborhoods, like families, are far from perfect. We know that “building community” isn’t simply a matter of throwing a great block party.
Michigan has suffered twice as hard during this tough economic recession, and our subdivision has seen an increase in theft and vandalism. Which is why we got serious and banded together. We began meeting in kitchens and living rooms to brainstorm a few solutions. For starters, we joined our city’s Neighborhood Watch Program, and then established a neighborhood e-mail chain to help keep everyone informed and connected. In the process, we started learning each other’s names as well as the needs of our immediate community.
Of course, creating a real community requires extra effort — and modern life typically conspires against it. When we’re not multi-tasking at the office, most of us are cloistered at home in communion with the TV or the computer. Building a stronger, friendlier neighborhood demands that we move outside our comfort zones and get involved. It requires that we log off our computers and visit a local park or attend a town meeting.
There are many small steps you can take to strengthen your own community bond. For starters, support neighborhood merchants and restaurants, and subscribe to your local paper. Learn more about local issues and politicians. (If others complain that the government isn’t working, suggest they help fix it.) Make a favorite dinner for a new neighbor and offer to share tools or your snow blower.
As anthropologist Margaret Mead once said, “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.” – Cindy La Ferle
– Photo of Main Street, downtown Royal Oak –
Cindy on July 22nd, 2009
I feel safe in the neighborhood of man, and enjoy the sweet security of the streets.” — Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Special Note: On break from blogging this month, I’m running favorite pieces from my essay collection, Writing Home. This piece reflects on the importance of real neighborhoods. Feel free to share your thoughts on “community” in the comment link following the essay …
It had been a little while since we’d been together. But despite the unseasonably cool weather for June, the talk was as warm and familiar as the coffee mug in my hands.
This time, we were celebrating the high school graduation of one of our kids. It struck me, as I glanced around the room, that no matter how much time passes or where I move in the future, these folks will always feel like home to me. They are my old neighbors.
My family and I moved a few blocks south of their Royal Oak enclave a while ago. And as much as we enjoy the neighborhood we live in now, I have to admit I left part of my heart, not to mention a spectacular lilac bush, in our former back yard.
I was pregnant with Nate when Doug and I moved there. Obsessive new homeowners that we were, we spent our free time renovating and decorating. It wasn’t until Nate needed playmates that we started connecting with other families on the block. As another mom told me, children turn your street into a neighborhood.
Unfortunately, that street was a shortcut to Woodward, one of the busiest thoroughfares in Oakland County, and too many drivers were oblivious to our residential speed limit. It wasn’t unusual to spot carloads of teenagers (or clueless adults) speeding past our house en route to the drag strip at the end of our block. And how could I forget the inebriated savage who stumbled out of a car and relieved his bladder on the new pine tree I’d just planted next to our driveway?
Naturally, we wanted to protect our kids as well as the peace of our carefully groomed street. So we banded together — about a dozen of us — to devise a plan. We would storm City Hall and demand that our officials close our street. My husband, the resident architect, drew up plans for diverting traffic. All of us took turns hosting civic meetings in our homes, not realizing at the time that we were actually cementing a lifelong friendship.
Of course, the city had no intention of redesigning our street. As a token gesture of compromise, we were given stop signs, which mysteriously disappeared a few years later. But our “town hall” meetings didn’t stop. Instead, they morphed into coffee hours and block parties and semi-annual dinner outings.
You hear a lot of talk about community these days – why it’s not as easy to cultivate and what we can do about it. Blaming our corporate work ethic and the time we spend on the Internet, sociologists claim that neighborly activities like pot-lucks and plant exchanges are remnants of the Victorian age.
Not so, in my experience. My family and I learned the secrets of community building in our early years as homeowners, thanks to a handful of neighbors who cared about something bigger than their own backyards.
Today, the little ones we were trying to protect from traffic are licensed drivers. Some, like the one whose graduation party I attended last week, are leaving for college in the fall. But they all seem to appreciate the friendships that grew around them years ago, and they promise to keep coming back to celebrate.
– This essay originally appeared in June 2003 in my “Life Lines” column in The Daily Tribune (Royal Oak, MI) –
Cindy on December 29th, 2008
“Be always at war with your vices, at peace with your neighbors, and let each year find you a better person.” — Benjamin Franklin
I stopped making New Year’s resolutions a long time ago. They rarely stick — and only serve to throw me into a vicious cycle of guilt, remorse, and self-contempt for the better part of January.
Instead, I stumbled on another ritual that works in the long run. I call it my “lessons in the rear-view mirror” exercise, which is simply a review of what I learned throughout the past year. Here are a few of my hard-earned epiphanies from 2008:
* Change, hope, democracy, and possibility aren’t just verbiage for a campaign slogan. Despite an incredibly vicious presidential campaign that pitted neighbor against neighbor, the first African American was elected to the highest position of government in the United States. The epitome of grace under pressure, Barack Obama reminds me that anything is possible in America, and that people who expect more from life (and themselves) often get it.
* When friends and neighbors truly love you, they won’t sever the relationship just because you didn’t vote Republican or put Obama signs on your lawn. The really good ones still bring you coffee cake.
* Frugality is cool again. In the midst of a long recession, conspicuous consumption has gone the way of the manual typewriter. Many of us woke up to the fact that we already have everything we need — including a supportive family, longtime friends, good neighbors, and a closetful of unworn clothes that still have price tags hanging on them. Our houses are big enough, our cars are new enough, our lives are rich enough. Enough is enough.
* There’s no such thing as “getting ahead.” When everything around you is changing rapidly, slowing down to catch your breath is often the best course of action. I regret that I spent the first half of my life dashing frantically from one activity to the next, as if there were a contest for the achiever who got it all done first. “What will your tombstone say?” humorist Loretta LaRoche asks us to consider. “Will it say, ‘Got it all done, dead anyway?’ ”
* We all deserve to be paid what we’re worth, whether we practice dentistry, carpentry, or journalism. Our experience and expertise have value — and others have more respect for services they have to pay for. When I give away my professional skills, people not only perceive me as generous, they also think of me as a walking freebie. I also make it harder for my colleagues to earn a decent wage.
* Parenting is the most important job a person can ever do, and it’s worth giving it the absolute-best you’ve got. Kids grow up faster than you can say “empty nest.” It’s a sappy cliche, I know, but until you watch your kid pack the car and drive off to his own new place in another state, you don’t really believe it.
* When someone steals one of your best ideas, it’s hard to get it back.
* You can’t take anything for granted. The Detroit newspaper crisis got me thinking about my 25-year career writing for print media. My smallest paychecks — and my biggest thrills — were always earned from a byline in my local newspaper. As Joni Mitchell sang, “Don’t it always seem to go, that you don’t know what you’ve got ’til it’s gone…”
* Support networks really work. Having a posse of gifted writers with whom to commiserate has kept me sane — and hopeful — and I’m forever grateful for their friendship. Despite all the bad news for print media, writers are an optimistic bunch. Already, fresh ideas are brewing and there’s plenty of positive talk about publication start-ups and new ways of making a living with words. There’s hope in the midst of change.
* Love makes everything better. Everything.
HAPPY NEW YEAR!
– Cindy La Ferle
