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I think some folks legit struggle with how to be a neighbor. They don't have a model for it.

My model was my dad. He talked with everyone on our block: the racist dude, the drug dealers, the drop outs, the single moms, the snooty bougie folks, the old ladies and uncles.

He mowed the lawns of the shut in; he dropped off extra turkey packages for families; he showed up in court to keep someone's sons out of jail.

When the first immigrant family moved in on the block and everyone was grumbling my dad was the FIRST person to loudly hang out on his porch and yell hello to the Mexican family next door.

Sure; my dad was a pastor, and that practice of caring for a congregation was his ethical foundation. But he was also like this before he had a church.

There was NEVER a drive by on our street. Not a single gang flare up.

Because my dad neighbored the fuvk out of that block.