What is a Neighbor

It is January 2022. I just left my weekly women's activist Zoom group. One of the "thought leaders" in the group declared America is already in a civil war and she is up for whatever that means.

"I've lived a good life, I'll gladly go out over this cause, if that's what it comes to! Democracy is something I don't mind dying for."

With that, she—and her chair– tipped over backwards, exposing more than slippers, socks and bare legs. She somersaulted in a full flip and her Zoom square went quiet for a good twenty seconds. We screamed!

"Jean?! JEAN! Are you okay?!"

Soon she rose from the floor, robe askew, platinum hair going in seven directions. Without missing a beat, she stuck her face in the screen.

"And one more thing. The other side has guns. If you don't have one, you had better buy one and learn to use it."

So ended our political meeting. When a Progressive is telling you to get a gun and use it—something is amiss. But Jean had taken a stand...a stand while sitting...from a wobbly chair, but still a stand. And what she said got me thinking. Not about getting a gun, but about what do I stand for in these times?. In any time. I revisited my basic core values...

Service, community, family, culture, free expression, restoring the earth.

I contemplated my life, my daily life. Is it a match? Do I live a life that reflects my values? I work with kids in my community. I help them discover what they never thought they could do...

Through our creative work, we become a family. We keep a low carbon footprint, performing in re-purposed costumes and hand crafted props and often in we perform in the park. They know they can come to my house for anything. My home is also open to the kids on my block. What else? I take this work to children from other countries: from rural villages in Africa to mountain towns in central Mexico.

I'm pretty sure my core values line up with my daily life. Believe me, it's not a chore. I do what I love. I get to hang out with young people and that keeps me hopeful, connected, current and patient.

But for 2022—in these extreme times—how can I be of extreme use? I thought about my block, how my neighbors have gone so quiet. Covid is lifting but I think people aren't getting the memo that it's really okay to go outside!

What happened to the good neighbor? What happened to the good citizen?

They are still around I'm sure, but we aren't getting those reports from the media. For 2022, it is my mission to keep my home and myself available to young people to the best of my ability. I am letting our troupe of young actors (some are neighbors) know that I will keep my door and my back yard open for them. This week I will visit each kid on my block who always considered my house their second home. They now have younger siblings and I plan to invite them to play in my back yard, join the Shakespeare program, and visit here whenever they want.

I moved to Mid City twelve years ago with my two children. The front yards were open. No fences. There were three ice cream trucks, a corn vendor, a tamale car and Caesar's truck which sold everything from ice cream to mangos. The first day we arrived, there was a knock at my door from my neighbor, Evelyn and her son Wilson, 6. She had made a platter of sopas for us. Evelyn and Wilson came in and we sat down and ate and visited. Evelyn kept two jobs to raise Wilson and Michelle. We became great neighbors, watching out for each other's kids and having each other's backs. One day Evelyn got a letter from ICE; she and her entire family might be deported to Guatamala. Evelyn asked me to write a character reference for the judge.

...Evelyn has been the best neighbor I have ever had. She hold down two jobs, is a taxpayer, a good citizen, a friend and more "American" in that sense than many of my former Hancock Park neighbors who only come out from behind their security fences to drive to work...

The family was not deported, thank God. Wilson and my son are twenty now. Wilson still calls me mom and my son calls Evelyn Ma. When people ask him, "What are you?" he says "American."

In the past couple years, the neighborhood has shifted. A rapid incoming population have bought homes here for "bargain" prices. I am sad to say, the first thing they do is put up a high security fence and slap a sign with an angry dog on it. I took a walk to the post office yesterday. I noticed about eighty percent of the front doors had those ugly metal security screens. (The doors I could see, that is.) The doors I couldn't see were behind those new fences. If we long time residents have a fence in front of our house, it's flimsy, quaint and decorative. It's not to keep you out. Crime is up across the city, but my house will not be getting a security fence or a metal screen door. As for you High Fence People: if someone wants to invade your crib, they will. In fact, they might like the challenge you've given them.

So for 2022, Americans can fight all they want from marble rooms and square screens. I'm going live. My intention is not to shut people out, it's to invite them in. A real neighbor, not a NextDoor.Com neighbor, spreading suspicion from a screen behind a locked fence.

I will model what I learned from the open armed community of Motopi, Botswana. Interdependence. I was told (by the village leader) I had been the first visitor to Motopi from the "industrialized world." I was quickly made a member of the community. Neighbors made themselves available. For everything. Pinky helped me identify which bugs were safe and which would give me blisters. The first night, I turned off the breakers to three small houses, affecting 19 other people. Pinky came over in her robe and set things right. When I fed the village dogs in the wrong bucket, my neighbors taught me that they only eat from a designated trough, out of respect. Neighbors here say hello to you, no matter what, as they pass every day on the footpath. Everyone sees everyone. The best I can do with what I learned there is to practice it in my neihgborhood.

So my home will stay a safe haven for kids on the block. My driveway was always known as the conflict-resolution spot. It started with Michael across the street. One afternoon Michael got emotional and pushed over trash bins. The other kids were going after him, then Jaqueline called me outside. She had taken my Shakespeare class at the library and remembered we did games for big emotions. We circled up in my driveway and came up with a solution with Michael. They all admitted they were teasing him. The end result, they helped Michael bring all the trash bins upright.

This kind of work is the best I can do as a Neighbor. I grew up in a lonely closed off home. I can remember thinking, when I have some control over my life, it won't be like this. It isn't.

To those of you in political groups on zoom, contemplating civil war and guns and crime...try just being a good neighbor. A human among humans.

Greet your neighbors instead of looking down as they pass you. Open your doors and take down those fences. Even if your doors and fences are the ones in your mind.

You will realize there are still pretty great reasons to wake up in the morning.