COMMUNITIES vs NEIGHBORHOODS

Have you ever heard of an old neighborhood reunion...? To appreciate the question, neighborhoods must be contrasted with communities (be the communities real or virtual). While one can argue definitions and distinctions, it's hard to argue that neighborhoods are fast disappearing...!

You would probably have to be over 60 to have lived in a neighborhood. Those were the 20th century years in which big cities were proliferating, but in order to be rooted in their bigness you attached yourself to something small. The front-porch neighbors, mom&pop stores, school, church and playgrounds all within a walk and a wish. Which is what motivated a dear friend's recent return to his "Jersey neighborhood reunion." Old and fast friends whose mother and father you knew, whose first loves you may have shared, whose scars and heartaches you know well, and all of whom made a lasting contribution to so many of the views and values you've carried with you ever since.

Today there is no lack of communities -- real and virtual -- because we have become more wings than roots. Cars, phones, trains, planes and of course the computer has shaped a staggering lacework of instant inter-personal connections.There are communities of lawyers, doctors, teachers, fraternities, sororities, artists, country clubs, plus those burgeoning digital enclaves in which we can live 24/7 with our websites, blogs and tweets. Each of these communities is pregnant with wonderful possibilities. They grow and they thrive, making the old 20th century notion of neighborhood a distant -- perchance dated -- affair.

Urban sociologists put different lenses to this phenomenon. It if frequently called: Change, progress, the reconstitution of urban interpersonal dynamics. They all sound right to me. Only I wish I had been at my friend's old neighborhood reunion party. There were so many folks gathered there that the local newspaper covered and caressed the event. Remember "Cheers" where everyone-knew-your-name...? Hold that picture and you've got my friend's coming home celebration...!

Now wait -- this is not some sentimentalized no-country-for-old-men complaint. Simply a thoughtful look over the shoulder to a time -- whether created by cultural imperatives or familial affections -- when life was slower, tighter, simpler, and perhaps more enduring. However, that was then and this is now. Now is where we are, and where we have to live.

Still -- have you ever watched grandchildren curl up around grandparents with curiosity in their eyes when the elders reminisce about an age they will never know? I have. I'm sure many of those urban sociologists have too. What's intriguing is to hear the kids -- surrounded by their PCs, iPhones and iPods -- react to your stories with their ultimate approbation: "Cool...!"