The Place I'm In

The Place I'm In

I live in a place that seems odd to me, if to no one else.  People have flocked here for just over twenty years, which may not seem like a long time to you, but if you do the math this phenomenon began in the century  previous to this one.  I know that doesn't quite sound right, but neither did "the previous century" or "the last century" or "the prior century."  

Either way, it was longer ago than you might have thought.  To my eyes, where they have been flocking to for the past three or four years, the houses resemble each other so much that they almost always bring to mind the lyric from Pete Seeger's cover of "Little Boxes, which was written by Malvina Reynolds even further back in that century I was talking about." The lyric goes on about those "Little Boxes, which were "...all made out of ticky tacky and they all look just the same."  While some might observe that the Hardi-Plank cement siding that covers all of the houses here, which is made of  a fiber cement that is a composite material made of sand, cement and cellulose fibers is the closest thing to "tacky-tacky" they have ever seen, my brain associates them with the phrase "and they all look just the same."  

It doesn't bother most residents.  They can see it when the sales person drives them around here to show them available lots, and they buy regardless.  It's not that I am looking down my nose at these folks--I bought here, too.  But there's a sameness that seemed to grow as the hundreds of houses built since I moved in a little over a year were occupied (by people all of a "certain age.").  Pete Seeger was singing to these people just as he sang to me back in 1968.  

Each time I drive along the highway leading past this place, I am reminded of a lament I heard from many folks raised in the South.  They waxed nostalgic about the bountiful swamps that lay along both sides of the road in these parts until they were all drained and filled to be used for "homogeneous pine plantations."  Me, I'm a latecomer here and I mourn the loss of the pine plantations replaced by all these little boxes.  (Please note that I resisted the temptation to say I "pined for" the days of those plantations--I guess I didn't resist it after all now).  

Inside the walls of this place (it is surrounded by berms rising above eye level, and the roads in are guarded by manned and unmanned entry gates), there are quite a few odd things, but I won't try to describe them all.  I'll just share today's simple sight.  As we drove home from visiting the beautiful May River to inoculate ourselves against the sameness here, I once again saw just a few of the hundreds of dog owners in this place.  There are so many you might think that a dog is offered as an option available in every model of house here.  I see these folks all walking their dogs, which stop whenever they please--whether it's to lie down to scratch their backs, or relieving themselves to mark some territory, or to do that one thing that signals the end of their trek for the day--taking a poop.  Immediately thereafter you see the owner bending down to pick it up in a plastic bag (ultimately the most immediate, if not most common, form of recycling of said bags), while the dog watches proudly and sniffs, as if to say "pretty good sh-t, huh?"  

Ah, just another marvelous facet of the place I'm in.