Dear Auntie Mac,

Is it me, or is Facebook’s Neighborhood Watch a bit overboard at times?  “Keep Out” and “No Trespassing” signs, cameras everywhere, suggestions to “Shoot First Ask Questions Later”! Every car driving slowly, or parked on the road, is suspicious? I’m all for neighborhood watch groups, but not for watching my neighbors. Are we not a relatively safe town, or am I missing something?

A Good Neighbor

My Dear Neighbor:

While Auntie Mac prides herself on having her finger on the pulse of all town-related news, she was unaware that the message board to which you refer was such a hotbed of feverish paranoia, so she took the opportunity to examine it. There does seem to be an increase in the number of postings from residents of this and surrounding towns advising of miscreants, footpads, and second-story men on the loose and in greater numbers than in previous years. But Auntie Mac would argue that this is possibly because the site in question has grown considerably over the time it has been active, and given that it is in our nature to want to warn each other of potential poaching pitfalls presently plaguing personal property, some leeway should be given to those who wish merely to hope that the dusty, sputtering Jeep with its dusty, sneering driver, does not draw bead on your porch, hoping to snag a tasty parcel or, in some cases, your mini-van.

Like you, dear, I pine for the days when rogues and scoundrels kept to their own towns and pillaged in appropriate neighborhoods, but as we have seen, times are indeed tight. One’s indignation that “that sort of thing doesn’t happen here” is veritable catnip to a desperate entrepreneur following a dubious moral compass. The smugly unsuspecting are the nouveau-criminal’s target du jour.

Auntie Mac does not think that we should “watch our neighbors” in the context that you imply; rather, we should get to know our neighbors, and the most basic of their habits, so we can tell the census taker, “yes, the Finknottles live across the street,” or deliver a lost cat to its frantic owner, or call the woman two houses down to inquire if indeed a dusty, sputtering Jeep should be parked in her driveway while she is at work.

One of the ways we as residents and neighbors can mitigate (but sadly not eliminate) the need for those “No Trespassing” signs is to get to know each other. It is no use pretending that Hampton is some sort of Brigadoon that the world outside its borders cannot touch. If we know as much as we can about our town and its rhythms, the cautions and warnings we give each other will seem not so much overly fearful hysteria but common-sense caring and protectiveness. Because eventually, the dusty, sputtering Jeep, in one form or another, is bound to approach us all.

 Your Auntie Mac