CityViewNC.com
|
17
The City of Fayetteville wants you to
can the waste! With our can do
commitment to service, we make
curbside pick-up convenient for
household waste, yard waste and
recyclables. For details, see
CityofFayetteville.org/environmental_services/
.
You Can Make the Difference
To encourage City residents to
make recycling second nature, we make
curbside recycling easy. Just can all types
of recyclables together in your blue cart.
For more information, see
CityofFayetteville.org/curbside/.
When it comes to littering, please
Keep it . . . then can it! Make "responsible"
trash disposal a habit and help keep our
great city clean and beautiful.
www.CityofFayetteville.org
433-1FAY (1329)
the car belonging to my current crush
slowly cruising towards my house.
Sometimes the boy would honk as he
drove by and other times, he would stop
to talk since he "just happened to be in
the neighborhood."
Teens who have grown up with in-
stantaneous, ever-present forms of con-
tact like Facebook or Twitter have no
idea what a thrill the romantic drive-by
was for people of my generation. Our
methods of communication were un-
reliable and sporadic at best, so a boy's
visit to a besotted girl sitting on a front
porch was indescribably intoxicating.
People sat on front porches for all
kinds of reasons. Once, when I was
home from college, I went to the bank
to cash a check. Not long aer I le my
house, my mother heard a report on
the radio that a local bank robber had
taken a young woman hostage. ink-
ing the worst, as mothers tend to do, she
and my sisters kept a vigil on the front
porch until I came home. Not knowing
what was going on, I arrived to receive
the most enthusiastic welcome ever
from my family. By the way, the actual
female hostage was returned safely to
her family.
A sociologist once suggested that
neighborhood cohesion began to erode
in the 1960s and 1970s when develop-
ers stopped building houses with front
porches and began building houses
with backyard decks and patios. People
no longer knew their neighbors because
they all were isolated in their backyards,
and consequently they did not develop a
sense of community.
I believe that the sociologist may
have been correct. Fortunately, I have
noticed in the last few years that many
of the houses being built in my neigh-
borhood now have front porches. e
people who live in these homes seem to
like spending time outdoors, swinging
and watching their children play in the
front yard.
Who knows? Maybe one summer
night I'll even see a little girl chasing
fireflies.
CV
Mary Zahran, who at this very mo-
ment is waiting for the ice cream truck to
drive down her street, can be reached at
maryzahran@yahoo.com.
