So I was out working in my yard the other day. I've met a lot of my neighbors that I didn't know recently, because as I'm working in the yard, they stop by to chat as they're walking the dog, etc. I'm really getting to know the neighborhood. It's nice.
One of my neighbors is an elderly woman named Joanne. She lives only three doors down from me, but I had never met her. We chatted for a few minutes, and she said, "You know, I'm so glad you left the JW organization." "How did you know that?" I bemusedly asked. "Oh, my daughter went to school with so-and-so (a nominal Witness who lives down the street) and she told me."
I was struck by how much people in a neighborhood know about each other and the goings-on in that neighborhood. When I first left the borg, I was surprised by how my neighbor across the street knew everyone on the street by name and called out to them as they walked by.
It's still amazing to think of how coccooned you are as a Witness. You live in this tiny world, so you just kind of assume everyone else does too.
I was thinking the other day about that Awake a few years back about neighbors and how people don't talk to each other anymore. It just made me crack up. These guys clearly don't live in my neighborhood. If they came around these parts doing their "Isn't it a shame that people don't talk to each other anymore?" spiel, they wouldn't get too far.
It's just a continuing revelation, how much community there is in the real world.
SNG