Community in the Country

Camino, Cathedral, Café

After moving to a town few people have heard of, in a state even fewer people could place on a map, landlocked in the middle of the North American Continent, I have fielded a lot of questions. Most could be boiled down to one word:

Why?

I answered that question last year in Going Rural Changed My World.

The next question is usually How? And more specifically, how does one find, or create community in “the country”. Here is that essay.

Connecting with the Neighbors

Our neighborhood is a short walk to the national forest and a short walk into town. For the first time in our lives no one lived above or below us. With no shared walls, the air gap invited us to meet our neighbors.

When we lived in the San Francisco Bay Area, it seemed everyone was too busy to even say hello. But out here, people acknowledge each other. I met one neighbor while he was raking his lawn, an old retired man of Irish descent. We must have talked an hour before we parted back to our homes. The single mother across the street we met as she was walking her dogs with kids leading the charge on their bikes. The widow next door, who had no problem walking over and knocking on our door. Could we get her mail while she was gone? Sure. We learned to keep a healthy stock of coffee, tea, beer, and whiskey for anyone who could call on the day. Even the Mormons can’t seem to have any of these, still they come by to say hi every so often.

Out here people don’t just want to get to know you, you are a part of them, as much as they are a part of you. I was driving home from a meeting the other day when the single mother who may be all of 5 feet tall was attempting to assemble a basketball hoop in the street for her young son. Even though I was going to miss my next meeting, I went over and assembled the thing. We wouldn’t have it any other way. 

Last year, when my wife collapsed shortly after coming home from delivering our son, as the EMTs carried her away, the widow next door was there to help me with our newborn. The Irishman from across the street helped us with our yard. The family down the road brought us so many things.

Though I worked in tech for over a decade, I have never been a part of a company of people as dedicated to each other as my neighbors. How do you find neighbors like these? I don't know exactly, but I know it at least begins with getting to know your neighbors.

Going to Church

It would seem this is becoming more interesting in the 21st century as I’ve begun to see more people young and old go back to church. At least in North America where the three federations have varying degrees of religious freedom, why not go to church?

Out in the interior, there are still churches where people wear their Sunday best AND churches where you can find lumberjacks and mountain men looking as though they just emerged from the woods. 

When we moved into our home that we’ve been renting, we asked the owner (who also helped us move in) where we should go to church. He told us where he and his family go and we have been there ever since. 

Most churches have that person you need to meet that knows everyone and will connect you with who you need to know. Usually just staying after the service and talking to people will get you to that person. After two Sundays we had been placed in a group of people roughly the same age and life stage as us. Sure we read the bible together weekly, but we also cook dinners and desserts for one another, help watch each others kids, and sometimes have woodchopping parties (after all we need to heat our homes somehow)

Church in the Americas is a sort of homeroom for life. It’s actually quite incredible. You get to choose where you go, what you wear, and ultimately what you believe. Being a Spanish mystic in a sea of Nordic descendants doesn’t seem to be an issue. In fact, it seems quite welcome.

Coffee is for Community

When you meet people in a small town, you go to coffee and then run into other people they know. Before you know it, you will have met the whole town. The guy who owns the big brick building, the woman who bakes the bread at the bakery, even the old guy at the bullion shop who asks me to “tell my friends” about his wares as though I’m a 12 year old kid in the 1950s, and I’ve just biked over to see the latest additions to his offerings.

Clocks are rarely used here. If you leave your home, be prepared for an adventure. On one occasion I gave a ride home to a friend as a storm had come in. Then to be invited to stay for dinner, though when we didn’t have dessert we all decided to venture into the downpour to the local ice cream store.

Can I bring you a coffee is code for can I come over with coffee and hang out on your couch for a few hours and talk. This is a wonderful invitation and one that shouldn’t be passed up. These are the deeper discussions that seem to lead to beautiful things if only that the people here who I see on a weekly basis are real people. 

This all would have sounded burdensome to me as someone coming from an often 80 hours a week job in a city. But here this is the speed of things and I wouldn’t have it any other way. 

There is a quote attributed to Yogi Berra that goes something like:

Nobody goes there anymore. It’s too crowded.

And I think the opposite is also true:

Everyone lives here even though it’s empty.

Until next week,

-Steven

Looking for more? Read my most liked piece from 2023, The Creation Story is A Love Story or foray into the spiritual discipline that fuels my productivity, The Miracle of Two Morning Days. To all my subscribers, my gratitude for each of you continues to grow. If you have yet to subscribe, use the link below.