Neighborz in the Hood

When I first bought my home, I thought I’d made a mistake. I have always heard about how when you move into a Utah neighborhood, everyone comes out to offer their assistance, you get plates of cookies delivered to your door within hours, everyone comes over to meet the new family in town. That didn’t happen for me. I scheduled my move in two parts. Friday evening some girlfriends were helping me move my boxes. Saturday morning some guys were coming to help me move my furniture. I was pretty much set with help, wasn’t really looking for any to be honest. Friday afternoon, one friend and I made an early run, filling my Trailblazer and her Sequoia. Pretty big car loads. While we were unloading, we noticed two men across the street walk out front and watch us and chat. They just stood in conversation the entire time we emptied our trucks. I made a comment to her about it, we both thought it a little odd they didn’t offer the help, they didn’t come over to introduce themselves to their new neighbor. We left. We returned a couple hours later with more vehicles, more women. We started unloading. Ironically, the same gentlemen came out front and watched as we unloaded the vehicles. Can you say: Déjà vu? They just stood and conversed as we worked. A similar scene the next morning as we moved in the furniture. So what is that? Déjà tre? Hmm, so much for a friendly neighborhood.

In the almost three years since then, I have made an effort to get to know my neighbors. There are some great ones. There are some I’m still working on so to speak.

Saturday I had the opportunity to participate in a bake sale for one of our neighbors. Do I know the neighbor well? No. They live down the street from me. But help I did, as did so many of our neighbors. I was so impressed. There were so many items donated and even more people there buying food. The result was incredible.

Our neighborhood really does care. Our neighborhood really does look out for one another. Our neighborhood really does help one another out.

My neighbors across the street – they’ve all moved out. I think they figured out they were in the wrong place. Living in Foxboro, not only do you agree to live by the HOA rules, you also agree to live the golden rule, which I prefer to think is: “Do unto others as you would have others (but would never expect others) to do unto you.”

Today I was one happy girl!