It was 1:43 a.m. on a Monday when I realized for the first time
ever that there’s a streetlight on my block. I made this discovery
while standing on the front steps of my house with a near-dead cell
phone in one hand, a flashlight in the other and a carbon monoxide
detector screeching away inside. Other than three (very lucky) houses
in the middle of the block and that one streetlight, my neighborhood
was completely in the dark and without electricity.
The guy on the phone at the power company didn’t have any ideas for me. Well, he had one:
If the house was well ventilated, I could wait inside. So I sat in the
front seat of my car. For 10 minutes. Then I called my neighbors,
walked next door and crawled into the bed in their spare bedroom.
And started laughing.
Read the article to find out why all the laughing and about author Peter Lovenheim's book, In the Neighborhood: The Search for Community on an American Street, One Sleepover at a Time.
