A Neighborhood Tradition

Ours is an extremely neighborly street. Each summer we pick a Saturday for street-wide garage sales. We have an end-of-summer picnic and a holiday party in early December. There are about 30 homes in our neighborhood association, and most everyone knows everyone, which is pretty impressive these days.

I remember our "induction" into the neighborhood. I bought my house in the fall and was there for the holiday party that year. I brought my then-boyfriend (now husband), and we met many neighbors - young, middle-aged, and elderly. It's a good mix. There are some who've lived on the street for 40 years. One woman has lived here for over 50 years! Anyway, everyone was so warm and welcoming. I was thrilled that I had moved into such a friendly, established neighborhood.

At one of our first holiday parties, we sat with a man whom I'll call Darren. Darren seemed like a gentle, intelligent, and polite man at first blush. What I didn't know was that getting into a conversation with Darren was like getting sucked into an abyss with a socially impaired, clueless slow-talker.

Darren likes to tell stories. And tell stories he does. He asked if we knew about what had happened years ago at the such-and-such house on our street. No, we didn't. Darren proceeded to tell us, over dinner, in excruciating detail, about a horrible, horrible domestic tragedy that had occurred in a certain house on our street many years ago (use your imagination and you will probably be right). While I think that it's probably good for neighbors to be aware of "history," sharing a gruesome tale at a holiday dinner party is, of course, completely inappropriate.

Anyway, each year two households volunteer to coordinate the holiday dinner event -- making reservations at a restaurant, collecting money, arranging for door prizes and such. Last year, Darren and another neighbor were organizers for the annual dinner.  The service was slow at last year's dinner, so to fill the gaps, Darren got up with a stack of papers. A stack of papers containing jokes he'd received through e-mail. He proceeded to read the jokes aloud. And they were bad jokes. Lame. Old people jokes. No, even old people jokes would have been better than these. They were just very bad jokes. And did I mention that Darren's a slow talker? Slow talker = bad timing for jokes. So, Darren's a bad joke-teller, telling bad jokes. You get the picture. It was positively painful to sit through the reading of the jokes. More than one neighbor, including the co-host, tried to reel him in. He.Would.Not.Stop.  Like I said -- clueless. Socially impaired. We were the first to escape this party, announcing that we had to go because we had a babysitter at home.

After these experiences, getting my husband to go to this year's party took a little coercion. I enjoy socializing with most of the neighbors and now know to avoid Darren. Like the plague. I knew he wasn't organizing this year's party, so there was no danger of another pile of bad jokes.

We went to the party on Friday, and due to a mix-up with some of the new people (not everyone who showed up had RSVP-ed) there was a seating snafu -- one new couple arrived after everyone else was seated, and they were going to have to sit separately because there weren't two seats together. My husband, gentleman that he is, offered his seat and moved to another table so that the new couple could sit together. I was OK with this. We know everyone anyway, so it was more comfortable for us to sit at different tables than it would have been for the new people.

With two new couples at my table, I assumed the role of welcoming neighbor. I'm usually comfortable talking with just about anyone. Give me a glass of wine, and I'll really chat it up. One of the new couples bought the house where the horrible tragedy occurred years ago -- I believe it had been a rental for several years after the incident. The woman asked if I knew the people who had lived at that house, and I said that I didn't.  I looked around and saw that Darren hadn't made it this year -- thankfully. He'd have given the new people an ear full about their house. While I had a nice time meeting the new people and joking with our next door neighbors, my husband whooped it up at the old folks table.

He really likes the older people -- they are a bunch of characters and sweethearts. And they like him. My husband is a handy guy, and he's done projects for most of the older people on the street. As I was having civilized conversation with the new neighbors at my table, it became clear that the party-animal table was the one where the old folks sat. My husband confirmed this later on. While my table talked Christmas shopping, old house quirks, and the onslaught that was Halloween, my hubby's table talked politics, prostate health, and strategies for getting a good parking spot at the hospital. Apparently those are very loud topics when combined with hearing aids and lots of alcohol!

Do you celebrate the holidays with your neighbors?

Comments

[Bluegrass Mama]

No one has lived in our neighborhood 50 years, as our 28 year old house is one of the oldest. When we first moved here, there was a Memorial Day picnic, a Labor Day picnic, a Halloween party and Christmas Caroling. Everyone's so busy now it's been reduced to one October picnic (kind of combining the Labor Day & Halloween events, I guess).

Do you supposed Darren didn't show because he got negative feedback about last year?

[Deana]

We are having a party Friday night for our neighbors and friends. Visiting via Michele this morning. 30 families in your association is alot.

[Marie]

BGM,
I don't know... my guess would be that he had other plans. He didn't seem to "get" that it just wasn't working last year... Though who knows, maybe his wife got through to him later!

Deana,
Thanks for visiting! Have fun at your party!

[Karen]

This neighborhood's only about 3 years old, and we just moved into it this summer.... no holiday gatherings here. But I'm hoping to invite some families from church over the weekend before Christmas!

[InterstellarLass]

I only casually know my neighbors. I've lived there for a year, and only talk to them when we're all out doing our yards. Both couples that live beside me are retired, as are the people that live directly behind me. With my elementary aged kids, I'm not sure we have that much in common.

[Anita]

Maybe you could arrange for a little domestic tragedy to befall Darren in the near future . . .I can't tell you how hard I was laughing at the picture of him telling bad jokes, badly.

[Marie]

Anita,
As my mother-in-law said in an e-mail to me before the party: may he have
laryngitis (not painful just vocally restricting!). It was very hard to NOT laugh as it was happening... Of course we all have our "off" moments, but he prolonged his -- just when we thought he was done, he'd start another joke. It was baaaaaddddd!

[Arethusa]

Your neighbourhood sounds fantastic. We don't have formal neighbourhood get-together's back home because everyone inevitably parties with everyone at else with events at church or parties held at someone's house.

But I'll be missing it this year since my Mom is moving to Alberta and that's where we'll be celebrating the holidays.

[shish]

Your neighbors (sans Darren) sound like so much fun. No such luck here. As you know, one of our neighbors hates us, and we only really know one other couple on our street (our neighbors on the other side), and we've been here 5 years. Here's to Darren-free parties from now on!

[Caryl]

I'm not much for neighborhood parties, but know many of our neighbors. I love the picture of the ornament - see, you are crafty!

Caryl