Coming in hot after a few weeks / months? of no memoirs, gonna act like it’s all normal. Don’t forget you can listen to these as well if you’d love to hear me stumble on my written words and try not to mouth breath into the mic. Sometimes I wax some extra poetic nonsense in the audio too, so could be some fun surprises idk. Today’s recording quality is super low and I made no edits to fix mess-ups so it’s what I think we call AUTHENTIC. Enjoy.
Walking around the neighborhood tonight was so fun. Ever since covid, going on these evening walks and seeing everyone’s evening routines and happenings is so enjoyable. Such a delightful way to be super nosey and awkward, looking into open windows, evaluating light fixtures, peeping on family dinners, game nights, and which of my mostly-very-blue neighbors are watching Fox News (it’s none of them, probably).
I feel very creepy in the wake of that sentence but let’s keep going.
Our neighborhood feels really unique, to me at least, a gal who grew up in a super traditional suburban development, in which all the 2- to 3-story mcmansions looked very similar, had probably a brick facade, 4 to 8 brick steps onto what could not be called a covered porch, but more of a trying-to-be-grand front entrance or stoop, the doors with the two top windows and 4 boxed trim below, probably a brass curly handle and paned or smokey window vents to each side. They had a 2-car garage to the left or right, or if very fancy, facing the side so the doors were not visible from the street. A driveway, always paved, usually asphalt, leading to said driveway, kneeling curb, basketball hoop every 3rd or 4th house, and most importantly: uniform mailboxes next to the driveway. With names like Abington Park, Bradford Landing, Chadsworth, and Chestnut Hill, the little streets and sections we all lived were the little pieces of “personality” inside a giant sidewalk- and pond- and bradford-pear-tree-bedecked community with the very esteemed name of Wyndham. Which you must say with an old school British butler affect, otherwise it’s not fun.
The neighborhood was a great place to grow up, please don’t take this snark for anything but cheeky reminiscence. American architecture and developer money-making goals really drive the design and aesthetic of where we all live here, and so it’s not anyone’s fault that some of these places have absolutely no character or uniqueness whatsoever. Except actually we can put all the fault on Bob, president and CEO of Whatever Developers, Inc., who just wants his profits and golfing trips and a boat if his profits are big enough.
SO ANYWAY lol this is why my current neighborhood, in which I own a house with MP, am raising 2 little boys, go on walks as much as possible, pick weeds, yell hey at neighbors, and greet my mail person, Mr. Roderick, is so fun and unique feeling for me. Because it IS, but also because it’s so different from the other neighborhood streets I’ve walked and biked and snuck through unsuccessfully to get to Alex’s house (or was it Chris? Maybe Joey? Name another 90s boy name and I bet I tried or at least thought about sneaking to his house, unsuccessfully) 2 or 3 streets away. Have you ever tried to sneak through a suburban neighborhood? Everyone has a fence, bro, you can’t. Ugh.
Ok so anyway AGAIN, I was listening to a spy book on my walk tonight and really able to take in all my feels as I was walking. Dusk was upon me, street lights popped on, and many people in this neighborhood choose to not close blinds or curtains, or even have blinds or curtains on their first floors and I find it refreshing and fun. Drinking game: drink every time I use the word fun, like good grief get a thesaurus.
Tonight I saw a family dinner, kids coloring, a son and dad playing a board game, a bunch of shitty TV (no Fox News, glad to report), a bunch of people sitting on big porches on rockers, a swing, and one kid on top of a table. I waved and said hi to no less than a dozen people either on their porch or out on walks as well. There is something so cool about connecting to people in this way, and having the camaraderie of living in this tiny little bubble of …fun? Definitely privilege, honestly, this neighborhood cannot be described as anything other than affluent, for the most part. But it was giving me all the warm fuzzies that I never got while walking my dogs in Wyndham in the early 2000s along gently sloping and curving sidewalks - none of which had pot holes or tree roots breaking through from 150+ year old oak trees. Both sights that are frequent where I live now and will trip you or throw the baby around in the stroller. It’s “character” I think, and I love it. It’s lack of HOA fees to keep sidewalks as manicured as possible, and I love that too. It’s city infrastructure and lack of rules which allow the neighborhood to have houses from almost all category of architecture and size, yards with manicured Bermuda grass worthy of The Masters, or overgrown gardens of exotic flowers and / or weeds, stone paths, statues, grottoes, fountains, and other absolutely-against-HOA yard situations. One of my neighbors has some kind of vintage / antique business and regularly has old furniture, vintage parlor chairs, and other extremely random accoutrement on her porch and in her yard. Is it sometimes an eye sore? Sure, maybe. Do I care, is it my business, does it affect me? Nope.
Something else I thought about on my way home is what a unique thing it is for this early-childhood phase. I walk past at least 5 houses on my block of my street alone, which all house one or more children under 5. And when I’m on these dusky walks, it’s a little bit weird, potentially kinda creepy, and also oddly reassuring and sort of building-a-feeling-of-togetherness and solidarity to know that all of us are likely doing the same things in this very specific time window.
If it’s after 5pm but before 7pm, the kids are feral and dinner is being made or ordered, toys are being thrown, noise is being made, and Daniel Tiger and/or Miss Rachel or some other godawful obnoxious children’s show is on the TV, probably not doing it’s job of settling the damn kids.
If it’s after 7pm but before 9pm, there is some kind of complicated and fraught bedtime ritual happening. At any given point, if I’m caught up with these friends, I know generally who will have a quiet house by 8:30 and who is on the struggle bus with nap transitions or bedtimes and wants to throw their kid out the window by 8:37 because GO THE FUCK TO SLEEP.
Walking around tonight it also hit me that this era of evening fellowship is ending for me and my house. C is starting kindergarten next year and his bedtime is gradually making it’s way to 8pm from a very reliable 7pm* [not to say that he has had smooth bedtimes since forever, only that 7pm has been the go-to bedtime goal in this house since he began sleeping through the night at 4 months old and Sara’s anxiety would and could tolerate nothing else].
There were a lot of things happening on the streets tonight with bigger kids. Teenagers playing basketball at the park, siblings in a playhouse in their backyard, some trampoline jumping, that dad and son playing a board game, movie night, evening cartoons, and presumably homework for the lot. Also sports and stuff, pushing dinner and bedtime later, and interests diverging making one kid’s evening look totally different from another, and not anymore because one kid loves to sleep and the other is fighting bedtime and the nap transition is terrible and keeps him awake until 10pm. The big kids are all in the bed they’ll sleep in until they graduate from high school, maybe. There’s no new-room or big-boy-bed transition, the stuffies and nightlight situation is handled and normalized, the kids are fine staying up late because they’re self-sufficient showering alone (I didn’t say they’re nag-free, just that they wash themselves with their own hands), do not need their asses wiped anymore, do not need mom to open the Flinstones vitamin bottle anymore, do not need an elaborate and perfected exact routine of book-book-song-book-song-cuddle-glass-of-water-hugs-lights-out-hope-for-the-best.
I am not under the delusion that bedtime becomes easy-peasy every day once the kid hits 6 years old or something. Parents of elder kids please do not come for me, as I obviously know not of which I speak.
HowEVER the variety of evening goings-on that I witnessed tonight between 7:15pm and 8:15pm was great and wide, and yet upon returning to my own humble block, with our almost football team size of toddlers and preschoolers, I felt a certain accordance, a harmony, a fellowship - I’m trying to avoid saying camaraderie again but that’s the one, isn’t it? Because I knew at my own house, my own boys were either already asleep (bless the toddler who loves bed and doesn’t want your snuggles) or on the way there, somewhere in the middle of aforementioned BBSBSCGOWHLOHFTB. I even allowed myself to smile at their homes as I passed, sending vibes - good ones, sleepy ones, patience ones - because that’s what I usually need.
So anyway really no point in this other than to give thanks for where I am? I guess? The world is a dumpster fire of epic proportions right now and a lot of shit is making me ragey, but it is nice to state aloud the little things that are brightening our days, our lives, and then realize that those little things are actually The Things.
Do you also have an army of preschoolers on your block? Forward this to their moms to let them know they’re not alone, whether their kid is sleeping or revolting, and the vibes are being sent.
kloveyoubyeeeeeee
