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SEPTEMBER 2023

Lately, I’ve been thinking about what it means to be rooted in community.

There are the neighborly hellos on our morning walk: Lucy weeding in the garden, Amy walking Peter to school, Tony tending to his dahlias, and Darren walking Buster, the 11-year-old Golden Retriever.

“Beautiful day!” One might say. “Yes, enjoy the sunshine!” you may reply.

But it’s those moments when you stop to talk—to ask how someone is doing, how you can help—that the roots of community grow a little deeper.

Whether it’s delivering a still-warm wedge of olive oil cake to a neighbor who lost their spouse last year, creating opportunities for connection in the choir or ensemble you teach, or stopping and holding the door for someone with an armload of packages at the UPS store, the message of community is this:

We belong to each other. We are responsible for one another.

Community shows up in surprising places sometimes: that moment of connection you have with the person behind you in the checkout line or the touching personal story a stranger tells you over a platter of shrimp dip with crostini.

In her book, The Light We Carry, Michelle Obama explains, "We get pulled into the lives of others by virtue of what they feel safe and able to show us, and the generosity with which we are able to meet them."

It can happen in one monumental moment or across several months, one small, careful step at a time.

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Last summer, we started something new in our neighborhood: a monthly social hour. We sent an email inviting neighbors to join us on the mall one Friday evening, bring a beverage and a chair, and visit with neighbors.

That first Friday, we had about a dozen people show up. Matt brought a tin of just-baked chocolate chip cookies and someone had a portable speaker playing music from their iPhone. We talked about traveling and gardening, company coming into town, and new restaurants. We gathered faithfully once a month into November (we had a warm fall!).

This summer, our monthly social hours have seen anywhere from 12-40 people ages 1-81. People come when they're in town, some stop by while walking the dog, others bring coolers and drag their camp chairs into a big circle. Someone asked if we could bring appetizers to share (the answer is always yes).

Because while we may have come up with the initial idea, social hour is a shared experience: My Grammy's yellow gingham tablecloth paired with watermelon and Texas Caviar and Wendy's homemade onion galette, plastic cups from Terry's kitchen when someone brought a bottle of wine to share. It's a place for us to show up as we are, meet others where they are, and share bits and pieces of ourselves along the way.

What does community look like for you these days? Where do you see opportunities to cultivate it—to show up somewhere fully yourself, to share a moment of connection and commonality with someone, to be a safe place where someone else can be themselves?