Day 29 Coming Back to the front...hope for humankind?

Alright so I realize that the title is a little dramatic...but let me explain:

I was driving through a new northside suburb (while on one of my rock quests)...and I noticed the darndest thing...the newly constructed houses do not have front garages, rather they have porches and back alleys. WOW...this struck me right away because almost all of the houses built in the last 20 years or so have small front yards, large front garages, and back yards with gardens and decks.

A couple of years ago I lived in a westside suburb and every house on my block had a front garage (mine as well). Everyone would come home drive into their garage and you would not see them again unless they were mowing their front lawn or leaving again in the morning. The most I interacted with the neighbors for the most part was through waves. We did the same thing for the first year. We decided the next summer that we wanted to sit at the front of our house, as we like to watch people as they walk by. So we would set up chairs on our drive way (yes we are the crazy weird neighbors your mother warned you about). Even when we would have company over we tended to sit on the front drive rather than the back yard; in consequence we met neighbors who were walking their dogs, checking their mail (suburbs have those community mailboxes - and the community mailbox was located on our yard), or just out for a walk.

I met a woman who lived a few doors down. She had hurt her back, had an intense operation and had months were she could barely walk to the mailbox. She had a dog she needed to walk and lived alone, so I offered to walk her dog. If I had not been out front I would never have met her. We had a wonderful girl across the street that was painting on rocks and selling them on a table she set up on her front drive way. When we came home she was trying to get the neighbors attention by yelling 'rocks for sale' as people drove by (and into their garages). When she spied us sitting in our drive way, she came over with a collection of rocks for us to chose from, we bought a few dozen, as did our company. We ended up commissioning her to paint us a large rock...which she brought over 30 minutes later.

Anyway...bare (is this the right 'bare'?...should it be bear? no that can't be right...anyway) with me...I do have a point. I think that when neighborhoods are constructed so that we drive straight into our homes without having to see our neighbors, never mind conversing or even knowing who our neighbors are, how can we build or feel concern for our communities? The community is so far removed as a concept in these neighborhoods, even though, ironically, the suburbs were created as a place for families/community building (I don't mean to suggest that suburbs are the only communities with out a sense of 'community'...many people who live various neighborhoods spend their time in the 'back').

I was talking to my friend John the other day he is going to put on a front patio, and I have walked past many homes that are creating new front spaces. Front spaces bring us back to, or at least help create, communities. The intent for this guerrilla gardening project was to transform an unused urban space into a space that provided food and a space for public interaction (primarily the latter). The amazing people I have met through the creation of the Boulevarden project, as well as my daily performances, have heightened my awareness of the importance of 'coming back to the front'.