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Post by cereselle on Aug 15, 2010 13:54:08 GMT -5
I still want to fit in..but I do not see it as a "fit in" type of thing any longer. I want Community. Real, genuine community..that is not cultish. The 1950's type of community that we see on those old black and white TV shows. Ladies having coffee and catching up together at the kitchen table, you run out of sugar, and rest assure, your friend Bette next store has some to borrow.... Friday night BBQ's in the back yard with the neighbors. Know what I mean? Has this all ceased in this crazy world? I totally understand. I want that too! I've read a lot about intentional communities, where a group of like-minded people create their own emotional and supportive community, either by buying a plot of land, buying houses near each other, or renting apartments in the same building. I think that modern society's view of the nuclear family as THE societal building block does us all a disservice. We need family ties, of course, but we need greater community and tribal ties as well. We evolved as social beings, interdependent on many people. When those community ties are broken, or are never created, our existence is much more precarious. Look at what happens when QF families isolate themselves. See how horrified we all are at Nancy Campbell's daughter's problems, and our feelings that those in her community (her parents, siblings, etc) should be doing something to help her. We need a web of community connection, not single chains of hierarchy. One link is too easy to snap.
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Post by humbletigger on Aug 16, 2010 13:46:13 GMT -5
ShellyC said . . . "The 1950's type of community that we see on those old black and white TV shows. Ladies having coffee and catching up together at the kitchen table, you run out of sugar, and rest assure, your friend Bette next store has some to borrow.... Friday night BBQ's in the back yard with the neighbors. Know what I mean? Has this all ceased in this crazy world?" One of the things I was amazed at were the changes I observed in the Mississippi families and communities that I had known in the late 50s and early 60s when we moved back in the early 70s after 11 or so years in California. My first wife was from Mississippi and it was a big, important part of community to get together as family and friends for a watermelon feed or a fish fry or a potluck or an ice cream cranking good time or whatever. Happened all the time. T'was good to be together. When we moved back . . . all of that had gone away. You hardly saw some of the family from one month to the next never mind friends and neighbours. Wha hoppen??? TV??? I never did figure it out but it sure was different and, I must say, quite disappointing to me for I had been looking forward to those good times again as I remembered them. And in the 15 years I lived there the second time the only community event of that sort that I saw was at the Union Community Center down the road from Ellisville, MS where they got together once a month for a potluck. That was good for sure but somehow it wasn't enough nor did it feel like the good times of those earlier years. Times had changed, eh? and not for the better in my estimation. Or was it just a case of 'You can't go back'? Know what I mean? Anyway, you obviously struck a chord, ShellyC, with that question, eh? John I remember reading somewhere that visiting with neighbors was killed by two inventions: the air conditioner and the garage. I wish I knew where that online article was. It made perfect sense to small town me. Before AC, people sat on their porches. Before attached garages, you would be on your porch in the evening and actually speak to your neighbor parking his car in the driveway next door. After AC, people stayed inside to watch TV in comfort, and with attached garages, even if you were still sitting on your front porch your neighbor would never know. He's just drive into the garage/house, put down the door, and never see you at all. So much of life is sheer logistics. ;D
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Post by km on Aug 17, 2010 7:47:26 GMT -5
Hmm... I don't know, humbletigger. People down South say the a/c brought economic productivity and flourishing to our region because the heat is so oppressive down here that it's difficult to work without it.
I'm signing on with those who are uncomfortable with overly intrusive friendships. I'm also very introverted, and I would never make it in any kind of communal living space...
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kathe
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Post by kathe on Aug 29, 2010 22:00:47 GMT -5
In Mississippi? Central AC! My mother was from Mississippi and I spent a great deal of my childhood in the Delta. We always sat on the front porch after supper, until AC. Nobody wanted to go outside once it was cool inside.
I love all of the cellphones, internet, all of it. My daughter is 800 miles away, but we can exchange text messages or a phone call any time. My kids all asked me to be facebook friends. I keep up with my best friend from college by email; that brought us closer together and I visit every few months now. I just found my high school bf again on facebook.
I play an online video game and have played with people all over the US, Canada, and Australia. A few of those people have become real friends. My life has been broadened and enriched by online communities like this one.
Things change; the good old days were never as great as people think they were. There are a lot of things we should improve, but there's a lot of good.
And if my husband and my youngest child pull out those IPhones ONE MORE TIME when we're out to dinner I may just knock their heads together.
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val
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Post by val on Sept 30, 2010 18:31:58 GMT -5
I wish I knew where that online article was. It made perfect sense to small town me. Before AC, people sat on their porches. Before attached garages, you would be on your porch in the evening and actually speak to your neighbor parking his car in the driveway next door. Wow. I know this is old but I totally get this. During the last big hurricane the power on our street went out for two weeks. It was amazing how much more social everyone was: sharing barbecue, percolated coffee, ice, and anything else that was needed. (We also went back to old-timey pettiness...people lucky enough to have generators were shunned- haha). We all basically lived in our front yards, and it was like that in a lot of neighborhoods in the city. Everybody seemed to love it. They interviewed kids who were thrilled to spend all day playing with friends outdoors (even without the video games and computers). Thing is, as great as it was, everybody went back to the way things were as soon as the electricity came back. Is it that we don't know how to form community anymore, or that we actually like our air-conditioned bubbles more?
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