Bids for Connection Across the Fence

Submitted by Nastinia Bailey on April 5, 2012 - 7:20pm
What do bids look like in your neighbourhood?

I've been thinking about "bids for connection" lately - mostly in the context of marriage but now I'm thinking about my neighbours. I read some of Gottman's work on researching how couples make many minute bids for connection with each other every day. Gottman was  surprised how minor these bids were: a glance, a gesture, a touch, a voice inflection. The results showed that there are three ways to respond:

  • positive response
  • neutral or ignoring response
  • negative response

And which response do you think was the most harmful to relationships? The NEUTRAL response! Yep, it is worse to not respond to that glance from your spouse than to respond negatively.

So what do bids for connections look like between neighbours? I guess it would be the neighbour who hollered hello to me as I was hanging up the laundry. He was in his neighbour's backyard and I was in mine and he could easily have not acknowledged me - but he did. I think a lackluster "hello" back would have been ALMOST a neutral response. I said hello and then invited him to come say hi to our grazing hens. He came over and ended up telling me about the farm he grew up on and the organic farm his family likes to visit. Or is that the fear? Maybe you don't want to make abid because if you say hello "too friendly" then the neighbour will come over and won't stop talking and won't go home!?

I'll give one other example of bids I see neighbours making and then ask you to give other examples. Sharing food is an obvious one. And a pretty big connection. I guess I'm more interested in the subtle ones like the neighbour who saw me in the neighbourhood grocer and asked me what I'm making for supper instead of just saying hi and walking past.

What other subtle ways do we make bids for connections in our communities?

Nina

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Neighbourly bids Submitted by Jennifer Laurie (not verified) on April 11, 2012 - 12:48pm.

Great topic Nina!  I love this idea as it pertains to marriage but really like your idea to apply it to our neighbourhoods and day to day life on the block.

Goderich has seen a huge amount of neighbour-to-neighbour connection in the wake of the tornado last August and it doesn't seem to be waning.  Just this weekend my husband Dave helped our elderly neighbours locate their property stakes and our other neighbour helped them plant a tree.  They never asked for the help but we just knew it would be appreciated.  Maybe it's a way to pay it forward?  Doing this in the hopes that someday someone will help you when you need it?

You mentioned sharing food (and here is a great post about food swaps and community http://rhythmofthehomeblog.com/04/being-homegrown-community/ ) but I think a major thing for neighbourhoods is tool-sharing - do we really all have to own everything, especially those items you might use once or twice a year?  Do we all need a snow-blower or a gas mower?  I know in intentional communities, there are far less appliances as living together eliminates needing 1 of everything for everyone but for those of us who live in single-family homes, there should be someway to share that eases the financial burden of ownership as well as the ecological burden of consumption.  Making a list of what resources your neighbourhood has and is willing to share opens the door to tools but also knowledge.

As for subtle ways to make a bid for connection, I think just being aware of what is the norm in your neighbourhood.  Like knowing the person who delivers the mail and what time she arrives at.  If you know that person even a little, you are more lkely to notice if she stops coming and ask where she has been.

Bids and asks Submitted by Raising the Village on May 7, 2012 - 3:25pm.

I often wonder about the conflict between not wanted to impose on your neighbours vs. being more open/vulnerable and going to a place of asking for help from neighbours.

We've found that the neighbours that we have asked for help from have become very close. Eventually they have also asked us to help them out. 

The "ask" is a bid too.. and just like your great example of taking the leap to invite the neighbour over instead of just a hello...asking can feel like a risk.

 

Sharing Tools Submitted by Nastinia Bailey on April 11, 2012 - 5:14pm.

Someone has created an online tool to make it easier to share tools with neighbours www.streetbank.com . It has a friendly helpful video to explain how it works. Their intro says that the average drill owned by a homeowner is used less than 15 min its whole life!