Last night as we were closing down for the night in the Campbell home, I shut off the light and said aloud, “I guess I can turn this off now. I always turn our front and back lights on, in case anyone wants to stop by for a visit. Never seems to work, though, does it?” The other Campbells around me agreed.

This is something I have been lamenting for quite a while. (Note: I chose the word “lament” because I don’t mean complain. I mean lament.) Our American busyness has nearly eliminated face-to-face, unplanned interaction with our neighbors.

Yes, we do see each other. We even get together now and again with friends. We Campbells really enjoy spending time with a couple different families who both live about a 45-minute drive from our house! (Definitely hard to “drop by” there.) We even see our friends who live within walking distance of our home, but usually in passing as we both continue with our to-do lists.

I actually completely understand. We’re some of the least busy people that I know, yet, with all of the very young people in our house, everyday life is full enough to allow us very little “down time” in our days. Now add to that every social, athletic, spiritual, community, academic, and assorted other schedules (for every person in the family) and most of us have lives so chock-full that we don’t really get to just “drop by” anymore.

Partly our culture is to blame. We are very individualistic. It’s the “American way” to the core. It starts with the notion that you can (and should?) be responsible for yourself, earn your living, and have a you-can-do-it mentality. (Note: that seems to be slowly eroding with passing generations, though. Current trend seems to be more toward allowing others to be responsible for your living … but I digress…) Wherever it starts, it certainly continues to the point that we rarely even see our neighbors, let alone interact with them.

And so we text. We “Facebook”. We email. (Does anyone besides me still email?) All ways to stay connected despite our disconnected lives.

Sure, we see each other. Most of our busyness is with other people. We are together in our busyness. But moments of just dropping by for a visit—at least from my vantage point—are a relic from another era.

It’s OK to move on, for sure. Everything changes. But have we lost too much? It’s amazing to me sometimes that I really don’t know most of the people around me. (Note: I intend no accusation or placement of blame by any of these comments, merely stating observations. If anything, I can actually take much of the “blame” for this. I could perhaps make more of an effort to just “drop by” for a visit … but am often feeling too overloaded myself!)

Perhaps it’s a winter thing. We do see our neighbors more in the summertime. Perhaps it’s just a “me” thing? (Do you fraternize with your neighbors more than we do?) Perhaps it is a cultural thing that just won’t go away any time soon.

For now, I’ll still leave the lights on.