Z Word
We’re all village people
A sense of community is important in life. We all want to belong to somebody or something. Mankind clusters in communities, geographical or otherwise.
It is a fundamental human need. Like dandelions, there’s no escaping it. Even cloistered nuns and Trappist monks are in it together.
Indeed, a sense of community is in our DNA. Except for a contented shepherd, few people reign on in splendid detachment. We don’t live in a hall of mirrors seeing only our own reflection (despite the ballooning of the selfie epidemic).
Since people naturally flock to one group or another, talking about the importance of community is like teaching Niagara how to fall.
Communities hardly are cookie cutter. Whatever the chemical content of a particular community, the formula works for their members.
A sense of community these days is not restricted to a particular neighborhood or locale.
That’s because they evidently stopped teaching geography in schools to focus on the Great Pronoun Identity Debate and everybody grew up geographically impaired.
A good thing they invented GPS, or nobody would ever get anywhere these days.
Imagine if Lewis and Clark had Waze back in their day. Their expeditions could really have been kickass. Armed only with a compass, those two really were badass. And smelled bad. After all, they crossed the western half of the continent before the invention of deodorant.
Of course, they did run into communities. The Apache. The Sioux. The Hekawi of F Troop fame. Lewis and Clark even smoked a peace pipe with Chief Dirty Neck of the Never Wash tribe.
Fast forwarding to today, a community could be soccer moms or biker chicks or golfing buddies or pickpockets or nerds or quilters or assassins or wannabe MMA fighters or albino dwarfs with pinkeye.
Some communities strictly discuss Icelandic literature. Others are hung up on Emily Bronte. Still others get together to discuss tips on how best to grout your tub while having sex.
And while social media friends are not the end all and be all when stacked up against in-the-flesh authentically genuine friends who definitely aren’t bots, there is no denying the sense of community people derive from being a part of an online group.
Americans used to stand tall. Now many of us are hunched over looking at our phones. If Ichabod Crane were alive today, he would be a fashion model. If Carl Sandburg were writing today, Chicago would be the city of stooped shoulders.
Belonging to a community gives us support. People, who otherwise would be aloof to one another, are swept away in the larger torrent of bonding.
Human beings are social creatures and relationships are good for our serenity. Otherwise, life can be more boring than watching the synthetic enamel fade on your mother-in-law’s dentures.
It’s a tough world out there and being part of the herd fosters a sense that we are not alone in this world.
No man is an island. Which is why people don’t want to die alone, although in the end we all do die alone. Your death bed may be surrounded by loved ones, but none of them will climb into your death bed to share your journey.
Sigmund Freud, B.F. Skinner and William James were never drinking buddies of mine, but I did pick up a smattering of psychology when I wasn’t snoring through my cake Psych 101 college class.
Membership is the feeling of belonging and identity, sharing a sense of personal relatedness. If a person doesn’t belong to a community, there is an awesome blankness about him. He is nobody. And probably unattractive.
Influence, or a sense of mattering, makes members feel like they have influence over the community and the community has influence over them. Which is why poets and diesel mechanics seldom bond. They have no influence over each other, either in plain English or iambic pentameter.
A community, like any other product, needs to do something for its members in order to make it worth their while. A community that doesn’t work for us quickly becomes a squirrel cage. And nobody likes a squirrel cage. Even squirrels.
A strong sense of community becomes more vital as we age so we aren’t as rueful and melancholy coming to terms with our mortality. When the Grim Reaper starts peeking over your shoulder, it’s time to send in a community of clowns.