By Jeff & Elizabeth Rooney
From March of 2013 to August of 2014, we lived in a downtown neighborhood, with lots of activity, lots of neighbors, lots of foot traffic and lots of relationships. We knew our neighbors almost immediately. Everyone hung out in front of their small houses, so community was natural and easy. For a variety of reasons, when it came time to buy, we found a great home in a quiet middle class neighborhood near my parents. Getting to know our neighbors has proven quite a bit more difficult here, because children don't play in the front, people don't sit and eat and talk and work in their front yards like in our neighborhood downtown. Our efforts have had to be much more intentional.
In October, we had been wanting to meet our neighbors, rather than just a wave and a smile. So we decided to cook hot dogs for Halloween, sit on our front porch, and pass them out along with candy. With rain in the forecast, our hopes were dampened, and we weren't sure what to do, so we decided to open our garage to our neighbors. I put out an announcement on our neighborhood website (nextdoor.com), and received encouragement and also dire predictions about the number of trick-or-treaters to expect. Apparently our neighborhood was one of those that received a lot of visitors from the surrounding communities-I mean, how much fun is it to trick or treat in apartments? The estimates ranged from 200-300 people. We started to panic, regained our composure, and then went out and bought 200 hot dogs, buns, condiments, and fruit punch. We passed out flyers that afternoon, as well. We had to clean up the garage, put in tables and chairs and some fun Halloween music. At first the visitors were mostly kids from our neighborhood, and we loved meeting parents and kids whom we had seen before or hoped to know. Later, larger groups of people came, clearly not from our neighborhood, people for whom trick-or-treating was a marathon event. Some of them had been trick-or-treating for hours and hadn't eaten or were exhausted. Many were curious or sat in wonderment at why anyone would open their home like that. So many were polite and thankful. I was really struck by that.
The rain held off until about 7:30, at which time we realized we had passed out 155 hot dogs, in addition to whatever candy and fruit punch went out the door. We all had more fun than we've ever had at Halloween, got to meet many of our neighbors and a whole lot of kids! People really seemed to appreciate the gesture and the sustenance, a chance to sit down and visit. We had many interesting conversations, and our next door neighbors came and hung out with us and passed out their candy at our house. It was such a blessing that everyone seems to want to do it again next year. Hopefully we can bring some of our neighbors on board, too.
I went to bed that night thinking about the words of Jesus, "When you give a luncheon or a dinner, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your relatives or rich neighbors, otherwise they may also invite you in return and that will be your repayment. "But when you give a reception, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, and you will be blessed, since they do not have the means to repay you; for you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous." Many of the people who came were not like people with whom we regularly rub shoulders. They didn't expect a friendly gesture and a hot dog. Most of them we will never see again. They probably just expected to be tolerated by those in my neighborhood, and I hope
that instead they felt embraced.