On a lovely Summer day, not too hot, not too humid, but just right, also known as Spring, I was over at BL, N& Sprog baby’s (mom, dad, 8 wk old baby) house for BBQ and pie at their Eckington(?)/ Bloomingdale home. Eckington and Bloomingdale are just outside the Shaw borders but with the same fun-fun issues as Eastern Shaw.
Of the many topics covered in the deckside conversation we talked about spending time with family and friends in the area. I then remembered a statement made by a young woman on one of the many discussion boards I haunt, about how she wanted an apartment building that would give her that dorm like living style. She wasn’t waxing for small bedrooms with dirty kitchens and stale smelling common rooms, but the community that the dorm provided. Sadly as we grow up and move around we lose that community and are isolated. There aren’t people you can just drop in on like the dorm. Here, now, you have to make travel plans to see friends or family even if they are just a 15 minute drive away. Everyone is so scattered.
Instead, the best thing to do is make community with your neighbors. I’ll have to credit the Internet with the friendship developed with the Sprog family, but they are close enough to drop in on. Then there are the people on my block. We drop in on each other to borrow tools, exchange ideas, pass along information, examine each other’s projects and just shoot the breeze.
I’ve come as close to the dorm experience as I care to go here. I have a roommate, I have neighbors I can talk to, family being in the area is good too, and I have community.
Take that Crystal City !Bppppppppppht!