News from Town
Let’s welcome our newest readers to the growing cast of Town Characters! Bethany, John, Jessica, Jeremiah, and Nancy 👏🏼
Last week while working at Frey’s Greenhouse rustling Christmas trees, I was touched by a song that I’m surprised I hadn’t already heard and loved: I am a Town, by Mary Chapin Carpenter (1992). Wow, it’s not a ballad but a vivid snapshot of the life force of a town. This mysterious ecosystem is what I’ve tried to capture in these emails and one that animates every minute of my days. Thanks, Ms. C-C!
My column on the glory of all things teaberry ran in the LNP Sunday Living section on Nov. 19th. Here’s a taste. Mmm…
If you’ve experienced the teaberry flavor, you’re likely to have a positive memory. That is, unless you’ve been permanently turned off by one commercial product foisted upon you as a child. I don’t want to spoil your appetite, so I’ll deal with that stinker later. Back to the sweet, cool, gift of nature known as the eastern teaberry, the….
And now back to our regular programming.
The Price of Privacy
The day in 1999 when our family toured our potential home in Lancaster, PA, two features struck us with warm wonder.
The first was its welcoming, upright posture. “Step up, and come on in” was the message.
The front door reached out its hand to lead us inside.
The windows peered at us with curiosity.
The roof pinnacle up in the trees sported a whimsical cap.
413 College Avenue’s verticality hit us on a subconscious level.
The second thing we noticed was more conscious:
The way the front porches and back gardens tied together the entire block.
Visually, the entire row of properties on College Avenue beckoned us to make ourselves at home in making a home.
Business in the Front
When these houses were built, it was assumed that living in close proximity to other people was an asset and not a liability.
Early in the morning I’ll likely spy Mr. Lu peeking out from his side alleyway.
In the afternoon I’ll sometimes share a nice chat with Miss Terry next door as we pick up our US mail and she pets Rue.
On a lazy warm evening, it’s not unusual for me to step out on our front porch and see (and smell) Al, seven doors down, smoking a cigar.
This is city, town, or neighborhood life at its best.
Out back, some of this neighborly visibility continues, though most of it’s been lost in our case.
Party in the Back?
Originally, all of the rear gardens were separated by antique wire fences about 42” high, engendering a sense of privacy as well as a feeling of permeability.
It’s comforting to catch the mundane activities of neighbors in my peripheral vision when I walk down our brick path to the driveway:
Chris, a busy anesthesiologist, hanging shirts off of his closed-in porch.
A Spanish-speaking family enjoying reggaton music in a circle of lawn chairs.
Greg, a computer tech with a mobile DJ business, preparing for a gig outside his shed.
If you think there’s a bit of the Snoop in my enthusiasm, you’re probably right.
Nosiness, if you want to call it that, is easier in a neighborhood like ours! But so is security.
Don’t we all want to know what our neighbors are up to?
And don’t we all want to feel someone will notice if our grill catches on fire or a real snooper is on the loose?
See-Through Barriers
Mr. Lu feels this way. If not consciously, he acts as a sort of sentry to our block: A spry 96 year old who’s outlived his wife and mother. Back in the spring, his well-kept row house went quiet, unusually so. I had feared he died, but his handyman1 assured me he was vacationing in his native Vietnam!
He still drives his red Subaru Forester and attends to his bountiful vegetable plants that grow on a trellis. He’s never picked up much English, so when we catch glances I say, “Hey, Mr. Lu,” and we give each other the thumbs-up.
If Mr. Lu should fall, I’d want to know that. But that’s impossible now.
Mr. Gorbachev…
Over the years, some of the property lines were delineated by wooden fences, but even those were on the shorter side.
Last year a young couple moved in between Mr. Lu and us. Friendly and honest enough, they informed us of their desire to enclose their back garden with an upgraded fence.2
I mentioned that we had already gotten an estimate on a wire fence to replace the deteriorating wooden one separating our properties, thinking they’d catch on to the general look of the block. No curiosity, even though I offered to pay the $1,000 to make it happen.
Their new fence would require the uprooting of three espaliers, fruit trees trained on wires that provided an organic and lovely separation between the yards. A wire fence would’ve complimented them perfectly, but I understood their reticence to becoming urban farmers.
I will not throw them under the bus (or the fence). They were within their rights to do as they pleased, and from their perspective I’m certain all they had in mind was the improvement of their property.
A half dozen estimators came through with iPads in hand. The couple decided on a six foot wall that, by most standards, upped the coinage of both of our properties. (They admitted to being a bit taken back by the price tag, and I swallowed my thoughts).
Your Rights or Mine?
The fence being installed, Becky and I spent a week mourning the loss of permeability with our neighbors on one side.
We were left with two consolations:
The fence is made of cedar which puts off a heavenly aroma, especially in the rain.
The builders kept to the accepted convention (and city rule) of facing our side with a flush fence.3
Are we simply getting used to it? Yes, but not yes.
In a town, sometimes values clash house-to-house where there’s no civil authority to nudge us how to act for the common good.
What’s left to Becky and me as Christians is “love thy neighbor.” We’re still figuring what that looks like in our dense town situation.
In the end it’s the social cost we lament the most. We simply do not see our left side neighbors nearly as much.
Chit-chat through the fence is a fading memory.
Sight lines up the block are diminished.
My junk pile along the fence is growing.4
Blessedly, interactions may still take place on or near our front porches, and we can still spy Mr. Lu peering out from his alley. That is, as long as he’s with us.
I write about this in my book Good Posture (Baltimore: Square Halo Books, 2017). One reader who grew up in a horizontally-oriented home told me she longed to experience the inclusive embrace of the row home. She now lives in one by choice in Lancaster City. Go, girl!
Their main concern was their young dog who they believed could jump a five foot fence. In all my years I’d never heard of such a things, and I told them so. But I was curt about it and should’ve kept my thoughts to myself. So, I dropped the fence subject completely. I respect them, and I don’t want to be known as a surly neighbor. (Great word, right?).
The latter custom seems to be rooted in a preference for one’s neighbor. Twenty years ago, on the other side of our back yard, an ambitious young owner wheeled in a crew and put up a rough-hewn fence. He faced the flush boards toward his own property. In addition, he erected a short fence between our houses directly beside our wooden fence. I eventually uprooted ours because two ugly fences don’t equal one good one!
Then two years ago I got permission from our current next door neighbors to replace their wooden monstrosity with antique wire. They were happy to open up the windows of our yards.
Hey, our neighbors can’t see our mess! But don’t worry, I’ll get rid of that lumber someday soon.