The European mind can’t comprehend.

About ten years ago I met a group of American exchange students at some high school event. The city (in Europe obviously) had* the most incompetent, mismanaged, underdeveloped, dysfunctional public transit system I had ever seen… and the Americans had nothing but praise and adoration for it. I couldn’t understand why, until I stumbled across Not Just Bikes and learned how fucking dire the situation is over there. The transit system is still the same, maybe worse, but this new perspective gave me a measure of appreciation. We’re not quite as fucked.

I’ve seen my neihborhood slowly shifting in the few years I’ve been here.

I got everyone on my small street to start gardening and they got other blocks to start, we all share our extra crops for the most part. No one is very good quite yet aside from a few houses who’ve been doing it for years and have been trying to help us non green thumbers.

There’s a plumber 2 streets over who’s lived there for a decade, I used him for a job and now he’s the go to guys for most of my direct neighbors.

I make my own oat milk so I buy oats in bulk. A few people in the neighborhood buy a bunch from me for much cheaper than the grocery store and some have even started making their own oatmilk with me.

Anytime someone needs tech support they come over to me first, I used to see a geek squad van in the niehborhood weekly since there a lot of elderly. I hate doing it, but my god those tech support companies are slimy.

I’ve done a couple carpentry projects in the neighborhood and helped fix quite a few fences.

I feel like I moved here and said “why don’t we help eachother out?” And it was a revolutionary idea that no one had thought about before.

When I was in the city it’s just what you did. People survived with eachother but out here in a weird mix between the sticks/suburbs it seems like most people don’t even know their neighbors names.

• Yes. Yes. We played video games or read books or had to have our parents drive us to a park or walked the whole way (no sidewalks) there.

• Because our officials are incompetent. Yes. Yes.

• See above on lobbying from oil and car companies.

• Because the word “commie” is scary to Americans from decades of indoctrination and the “nuclear family” having their own home is the biggest lie in the “American Dream.”

• Because of zoning laws. Refer to the above about incompetent officials. Yep, it is simply not possible and legal.

• Americans care way more about appearances than actually having things be useful. What can I say, we’re fucking coddled.

Hope this helps. It’s valid to still be baffled at such.