Nation Of Strangers

     My grandfather was a bar owner for sixty some odd years. He made a living off his regulars, standing behind a bar all day drinking miller lite and 'shooting the breeze'. Most of the time if he wasn't talking about the war he'd spin some yarns about 'the good ole days'.

    A grand old storyteller he was, mind you the more he drank the more embellished his tales became. One of his frequent ramblings was about block parties 'back in the day'. Everyone on the block in the old neighborhood would set a Friday or Saturday aside, block off a street and have a party.

     There would be food and beer and booze, and everyone knew everyone. People would play cards, talk about the weather, spread gossip and chat about politics. The kids in the neighborhood did likewise, minus the liquor and politics.

     It wasn't a great story, or even a good one but I was fascinated by the concept. I've never been to a block party, not in my hometown where I knew everyone. That's just not something people do around here anymore.

     Sure people go out, they go bowling, they go to bars. I suppose if you go to one place long enough eventually you know everyone that hangs out there, but it's not the same. The sense of community that makes a block party great is, for the most part, gone. The spirit of different age.

     I've lived in five different houses since I was twelve, all in the same town on different blocks. Out of all those blocks I can count on one hand the number of neighbors I knew by name. Just a bunch of strangers living in close proximity.

    I see my neighbors at least once a day. I don't talk to them but I know they're there, maybe that's good enough, I hate to think what that says about us as species though. Humans are social creatures, selectively. We pick and choose who we congregate with, so why don't we choose to know those that live closest to us?

     Fear perhaps, prejudice maybe, or is it just a lack of interest?
 
     Anyone who owns a home owes it to themselves to know their neighbors. Anyone who lives in an apartment building, even more so. At the very least to quiet or confirm their suspicions that the person next door is an axe murderer. Strangers make poor neighbors, and an even poorer nation.