Extremely Slow Makeover: Neighborhood Edition

I love Extreme Makeover Home Edition. Love. It. I watch it every Sunday with my box of Kleenex at the ready for the reveal, when the family falls to the asphalt and praises Jesus.

Ty Pennington? Don’t get me started. He and his army of volunteers can and do a total tear down of a house, rebuild it, landscape it and change the lives of one lucky family forever in 40 minutes (real time, a week).

I’ve been involved in something similar, except on a larger scale – Extremely Slow Makeover Neighborhood Edition – with a smaller army of just as dedicated volunteers. But, I wonder, how does Ty and his ilk deal with permits? Codes? The neighbors who live in the house next door that looked okay, but after the new and improved abode rises up from the ashes, it makes the adjacent home look like a hell hole.

Does anyone complain? Balk? Does the city council have to meet in order for the process to get started? Are motions tabled? Hearings rescheduled and rescheduled? Are funds a problem? Does Ty ever have an issue with a surely Alderperson? A not-on-board banker? Maybe that’s why it’s taking 13 million minutes, give or take.

I am throwing down the gauntlet. Ty, if you are reading this: here’s the challenge. You. Your team. Come into my neck of the woods and give it the once over. Re-do the main drag (we’ve even got a plan . . . it was supposed to be done in 2007, then ’08, then the City promised in ’09 and with the Stimulus money we thought it was a done deal, but, no. For some reason, it wasn’t “shovel ready.” Hell, I’ve got a shovel. I’m ready.)
Or . . . you pick the street and landscape the heck out of it. Every yard. Every house. Both sides of the street.

Come on, Ty one on! I dare you.

Local woman blames self for rash of neighborhood foreclosures.

Was it something I said, or maybe didn’t say? Was my friendly waving misunderstood?
Did the toot of my car horn have a tone?

The house next door is empty. The one across the street? Vacant. The big Victorian
right across the alley from our garage? Yeah, nobody home. I’m beginning to think that maybe it’s something I did. Or didn’t do.

I always meant to invite the next door family over for a barbeque and the family across the street, but . . . well . . . I just never got around to it. They seemed so busy. Coming and going. Did the guy work two jobs? I think the woman did.

I suppose it would have helped if I had known their real names. That’s a problem with my neighborhood – very ethnically mixed. Hmong, Thai, Vietnamese, Hispanic, Mexican – a lot of people don’t speak english and I don’t speak very fluent Hmong and can’t remember any of my high school Spanish, hence the waving and the beeping.

I knew my neighbors only by the names that I made up for them. Let’s see, there was the Pear Family – very big butts and kept a goat in their basement (a fact I found out from the guy who lived next door to them after they left in the middle of the night.) His name? Nearly Dead Ron. He’s an emaciated ex-junkie, not to be confused with Really Dead Ron, who used to be known as plain old Ron until he had a massive coronary in his kitchen a couple of years ago and was undiscovered until . . . well, that’s what the smell was.

The late family next door? I called them The Family, because that’s what they were – I know, I had a lapse in creativity when they moved in. I was in the throws of my personal Great Depression and the medication hadn’t kicked in. By the time it did, well . . . the name had stuck. The people across the street? Who lived in the former drug house? That I was responsible for shutting down? They hadn’t been around long enough for me to get a sense of them.

So, okay, I’m not a people person. I never was. I don’t even call my friends all that much. Of course, I blame my mother for that. See, back in the day, we had what was called a limited phone line, meaning we could only make one out-going call a day but, had unlimited incoming calls, and because my father was a police officer I wasn’t allowed to call up my friends and chat about nothing, because, what if he was trying to get through and couldn’t – no call waiting – and then, went out on his beat and got killed? Who’d get blamed for that? Guess. Score eleven on the guilt-o-meter.

Well, now, just a minute. Relationships are a two-way street, right? I mean, in my defense, no one ever made an effort to get to know me. In the 25 years that I’ve lived in my house, we’ve never had one Trick or Treater come and ring our doorbell. And we always have good candy! Mini Kit Kats!
I think it’s because . . . of our hill. There’s 13 steps to climb to get from the city sidewalk to our front gate and then another four steps to get up on our porch. Geeze. People! Make an effort! At least meet me halfway. Somewhere in the middle of the block. I’ll be the one in my car waving as I drive by.