"Come And Knock On My Door"

I'm sure you must be fed up with my continuing thoughts related to having moved recently, but it's my hope that I will be judged more kindly by history, as was the case for Truman. It doesn't matter, though. This post is happening today no matter how you feel. You might be able to affect future ones, and I will let slip that I am influenced by cash bribes. Anyway, read this:

It has sometimes been the case that I've had neighbors to visit (or conversely, neighbors to visit me), and my memory permits me to call up a few examples. In the old neighborhood when I was a boy, there was a family we mingled with regularly. Later, there was the old Italian couple next door after we moved. When I went to college in Chicago, I was invited to other people's rooms a couple of times, but it didn't get to be a habit on their part. The Koreatown hostel which holds the distinction of being my first semi-permanent home in Los Angeles was not unlike that, although really the pervasive common space rendered the concept of neighbors somewhat non-applicable (as was the case in my lodgings as a Boy Scout camp counselor). The home which succeeded that one was a split level duplex whose other unit was occupied by a couple of rather nice guys. In a way, we in our unit were more neighbors than roommates, possessing as we each did separate leases.

Following that place was one which would have seemed ideal for neighbor encounters. There were some, but they were of surprisingly low frequency given the number of friends and acquaintances who lived in the building at the peak (which preceded two separate incidences of police responding to rather serious calls inside  the complex).  Perhaps there might have been more contact between them and I if I had shown some initiative. I can easily imagine a great circuit of various movie nights, parties, barbecues, dances and swimming get-togethers which gave me a wide berth for lack of apparent interest on my part or maybe just because I was not entirely well-liked. I don't ever fault people for taking that opinion.

Should I have ever been the subject of general dislike, I doubt that to be the case anymore. Anyone subscribing to that school would seem to have dropped out of contact and let me fade from their mind, leaving just those who make a point of giving me every opportunity to include myself in 'reindeer games'. I grow and I change, and now I find myself in a building with a handful of my dearest friends within the building and a good deal more within a half-mile radius. I see this as being a golden opportunity for one big step forward in my social growth. Might familial inquiries about my romantic prospects be quieted? Whatever happens on that front, this should be a good year to come for me.