Neighbors, redux
May 21, 2025
16 months ago, I was pondering our neighbors, and I’m pretty sure I wrote about them even earlier than that but I can’t remember where that post went or how to find it.
We’re still friendly with our package safety neighbors. They’re always busy so we don’t hang out but we always wave hello and proactively help them out with their packages when they’re at work or traveling. We usually let them know when we’ll be away so they can keep an eye on our place.
We’re still friendly with one set of neighbors of many kids and much travel. They’re still doing lots. We’re usually always at pickup around the same time but occasionally one of us will miss or need the other to help and I’ve come so far as to learn to text them to ask for an assist with bringing JB home if I absolutely can’t make it. That’s blocked off on my work calendar, I won’t compromise on that at work but once in a while an appointment will run long or something will come up or someone will be thrown by the long weekend and forget pick up time. It’s good to have a fallback person.
We’ve made friends with the neighbors with three dogs. We yell at bad drivers together. When my job was a little less crap, I was stealing a dog or taking their kid for a little playdate every now and again. Whenever there’s someone shady on our street I text them and the more belligerent partner runs out to investigate. The wife asked to put us down as emergency contacts because their relatives are unreliable and their youngest knows to come to our house if anything weird happens and they need an adult, if their parents are around. I like both parents quite well. I’ll be sad when we don’t see each other at school pickups anymore. I’ll just have to borrow dogs more.
The one set of neighbors where the wife was distantly friendly but the husband wouldn’t even look at us? Complete turnaround on that guy. SmolAc started shouting hi to him randomly one day and it completely startled him. He started saying hi back, and even saying hi first from afar. Then his wife and I started talking a bit more about PTA news and random things and she offered us some hand me downs for SmolAc one day, so we got to talking some more and established our mutual loathing for horrible presidents. That was a good reassurance to have. The husband has a fun little hobby that SmolAc expressed much interest in over the years, the husband dropped by this week to invite PiC and SmolAc to go for a spin with him, how cool is that?
This reminds me of the former neighbors who used to avoid us because we had dogs, the husband had a total phobia. But when JB came along, they were so charmed by infant JB, they made our acquaintance. They were then completely won over by Seamus and converted into dog lovers. It’s great. It’s funny (and sometimes weird) how a baby can open doors where people are previously hesitant. In this case it’s great, we’ve remained friends for almost a decade and still see each other.
(It was weird when, to one Asian lady, I was invisible until I was pregnant. Then she was all smiles and friendly. What the hell with that? The former neighbors at least acknowledged us and it was clear why it didn’t go beyond that, he was obviously terrified of the dogs and we gave him a wide berth out of respect. But this lady looked right through me for years until pregnancy. Super weird.)
We have speaking acquaintances with half a dozen other neighbors almost entirely because I love their dogs and their dogs love my attention.
One of those dog-only neighbors recently had their first baby, and naturally I didn’t know the baby’s name or the wife’s name, so I addressed a little baby gift to the Dog’s New Human Sibling. I was assured by at least one parent that it was amusing, not offensive. I thought it was less offensive than addressing the gift to only one parent anyway. And, as a dog person, it’d tickle my funny bone to get a gift addressed to my dog’s human siblings. I left them our numbers in case they ever needed a hand with dog or baby. I don’t know their situation but it can’t hurt for new parents to know there’s someone nearby they can holler to for help now and again.
I made the acquaintance of two of our oldest neighbors on the block when I was having a rage walk. They’re well into their 80s and 90s, and have so many stories to share.
Building community is not easy, there are a lot of people who aren’t friendly at all and I’m really glad that our next door neighbors that I loathed left, but I’ve made a really conscious effort to build some ties in our very local community. I’ve always wanted something like that and didn’t think it was possible. Thank goodness for kids and dogs, so many connections were easier to make at first because of one or the other.
How do you get to know local folks and make new friends?
