When we bought our townhome in July 2002, I was very excited about my new neighbors. There were four townhomes in a row - between the four, there were twelve kids. Jacob's arrival in 2003 made thirteen. The neighborhood is pretty decent - not chic by any means, but a mix of mostly white and Latino families from all sorts of backgrounds. A few people who we might refer to as "countrified" for lack of a more polite term. These neighbors are the ones you tend to have trouble with and we did have a lot of trouble with one.
We had so much trouble that eventually one family left, bringing the total down to ten kids. Last night, I had nine kids in my house total as the family with six of them, my immediate neighbors, loaded the van to move out to Front Royal, essentially following the first family to the new town. They were renters - supposedly, the landlord will be doing some work on the house and putting it on the market. The kids ran amok in my house, all over the backyard, getting in the pool fully clothed and stay in until they were waterlogged prunes. I ordered Dominos and sodas and let everyone eat in the living room, carpet be damned. (Doesn't matter, it's getting ripped out next week!)
The four house used to have game nights and cookouts - they dynamic was dying out after the relocation of the first family and is now dead with the departure of the second. My husband is not real social, so I had to miss more get togethers than I would have liked. I enjoyed the times I did spend with them. Since I have no girls of my own, I was especially close to some of the little girls. Their birthday parties were my excuse for buying Barbies and pink, pink, pink!
New neighbors have and will move in, but it will never, ever be what it was. What we had collectively was pretty unique and even if we keep in touch, it will never be what is was. I feel a sense of loss about the whole thing.
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