Neighborpalooza

I usually don't tell people much about my neighbors, because the stories are so extreme that they are either not funny or they would not be believed. But for every neighbor who should live full time in the happy hospital, I have another who redeems all the crazy. They are why I still live here after 10.5 years, 7 of which have been like living in a Fellini film sequel directed by the Farrelly Brothers. But recently, I decided that this is what blogs are for - blowing off a bit o'steam.

Our neighborhood is a beautiful, conveniently-located historic district in Central Phoenix. The official district is only about 4 blocks long, but it surrounds a 3-acre park, fringed with ancient tamarisk trees. When I first moved in, in 1995, the neighbors all helped each other with projects, chores, and keeping up the park. There were very cool traditions, such as leaving Christmas Day alcohol on the porches of people who helped you during the year. By midnight on New Year's Eve, if you got stuck with The Head (a bizarrely-decorated doll) by an anonymous donor, you had to keep it in your house until some unsuspecting newbie got stuck with it the following year. Everyone trimmed the trees once a year, having breakfast together in the chilly morning air. A "pool party" painted the bottom of the community pool in the spring, with everyone signing the design.

Charming, yes? The neighbors were equal parts quirky and "normal" back then. One neighbor has 23 cats, and takes good care of them all. Another is almost deaf yet talks non-stop. They are artists and professionals, gay and straight, blue collar and unemployed, retired and college students, blacks, whites, and Hispanics. For years it was all tolerance and waves. Then came the split.

We're (and by we're, I mean those of us who still live in the concrete here and now) not sure how it started. I remember offering to do a website so we could trade skills and barter with association members. In the process of getting info for the site, we realized that our association rules still prohibited having "negroes and chickens" as residents, a rule from the late 30s, we think. We all got together to work on new R+R's. At some point there was disagreement over said website and said new rules between "park people" who had been there since the millennia, and some newer bees, who had been there only 10 years or so.

One person, a talented artist, was so upset by a decision to change her park logo for the website that at a meeting she held up emails and sketches as evidence of subversion while her hands trembled and her voice shook. She got so upset that she ended up stabbing her own leg with a ballpoint pen. At another meeting, the drunk park "president" greeted an unknown homeowner (a woman in her 60s whose family had owned the house for over 60 years) by shaking her finger in her face and yelling "Who the hell are you?" At another, an architect threatened me with physical violence if I mentioned anything on the website about incidences like The Logo Incident. City officials have been threatened at block parties that if they ever combine the smaller association with the much larger neighborhood organization, they had better be careful in the darker allies. One park resident threatened a city councilman while he was doing a job at the councilman's house. This was followed up by a visit to the park resident's house by the councilman and his friend, a police officer.

Another neighbor, who has a 12-foot urn in his front yard depicting a Roman orgy, filed criminal vandalism charges against another who was painting a backyard mural on the other side of his 7-foot block wall. The weirdest of the neighbors (think Crispin Glover weird) routinely talked to my dog about me while I was standing within earshot. Neighbors without computers and/or internet access screamed and carried on that the website was not printed out and mailed to them, that they should be able to participate in the online venture as well. When t-shirts were designed to be given as gifts to the "board," there was a revival of The Logo Incident.

The whole turbulent time seemed to end with the erection of a neighborhood display board, for everyone to post items of interest. Well, everyone with a key, which at last count was the cat owner and the angry artist. But what really ended it is the lack of participation by what we now call the normals. If you don't engage, there is no fight. Let them have their display case, logo, and paper website. Let them prevent apartment dwellers from using the pool - we all know the crazy lawyer pees in it anyway. Let them keep The Head, the alcohol, and the right to trim trees alone in 40-degree weather. Let them think that Roman orgies are great decor, while murals can only mean criminal vandalism.

Now, if only we can learn to ignore the frivolous lawsuits and threats of physical violence, we could all be good neighbors again.