Edwards Street, Berkeley
We’ve been invited for the 13th time to the annual block party. We make a meager appearance maybe one out of three visits. In our defense, we’re technically not on the block or in the part that is barricaded anyway. We’re at the end of the block on the other side of the intersecting street just across the street from the barricades. That we have continually been invited shows you how sweet the block of folks are. Yet, every year I cringe at the thought of getting out there.
It would be easier if we were actually part of the block. I know we’re not the only anti-social introverts. Other introverts sit on their porches and wave, and that counts as participation. We, on the other hand, have to bring a folding table and/or chairs (which you only need if you attend socials) and find someone else’s home to park in front of. Seriously, who in this house the social strength and eptitude (I’m making that a word) to manage that? Maybe our basset hound, Oli. Not any of the rest of us.
But that said, as I’m hiding behind my curtains watching the barricades go up while studying the printed schedule of events to determine the best time to slip the boys and I in for the minimal amount of interaction, I consider the importance of community, and I wonder about the preponderance of introversion these days.
In an essay about the Illinois state fair re-published from Harpers in A Supposedly Fun Thing I’ll Never Do Again, David Foster Wallace noticed how the people at the state fair did not seem to mind the endless amount of time that they spent in line waiting for rides or corn dogs or simply milling about in the crowded location. He struggled to fathom that patience, when he himself was used to urban life and the impatience associated with it. He speculated that urbanites spend all day around people. So at the end of the day, urbanites want nothing more than to sneak away to their own private abode. Rural folks, on the other hand, spend days alone or only with a few folks, and having been parched of interaction, are uniquely able to spend time in a throng of folks. I liked that observation.
It came to mind again later while I was reading Hillbilly Elegy by J.D. Vance. Vance retells the story of his childhood growing up in the rustbelt, hillbillies who had moved from Kentucky a generation back but who stayed firmly rooted in original community. Or, I should say, that stayed connected specifically to family. I appreciated the way that Vance retold his own story of success (and escape) and asked questions more than proffered answers. He did postulate (with some evidence), though, that children who attend church and/or participated in the local community were more likely to succeed in college and exceed the economic level of their parents than children whose families are isolated from the community. It makes sense connections that a community provides, the safeguards that it offers in the time of need, and in the case of churchgoing specifically, the ethics and morals taught all provide steps to climb. One is then led to infer that lack of success can be in part attributed to failure to become part of the local community, whether that means the church or even one’s neighbors.
Rounding out my “community” reading of recent is Parable of the Sower by Octavia Butler. That I somehow managed to not read Butler until now is shocking. That I read it at this particular point in time is apt. I recommend it and its sequel, Parable of the Talents to anyone considering the consequences of the current political and social trends. In this speculative work, the time frame is just a few years hence (it was published in 1993), and the setting is south of L.A. It qualifies as a dystopian work, though society hasn’t completely broken down, it just has failed any but the wealthy. She paints both the failure of society as well as the thriving of community in stark and broad strokes. In the beginning of the book, the neighborhood is the community and the members are completely dependent upon the participation of the community members to survive.
So with that in mind, I will drag my kids out for an hour or so, perhaps just until the sit down meal, and I will try to introduce myself to my neighbors. It is possible that they may need me, or I them, someday in the not so distant future.