Liars and Saints

  One funny moment in "Neighbors" has Rose Byrne coping with new-parenthood boredom. "I guess we'll go by the shops," she says to her infant, "then we'll stop by Mommy Group, to see what all those bitches are up to...." I've avoided Mommy Group--mostly--but, this past Saturday, I wandered into a "de facto" group. Oddly, my neighbors all have two-year-olds, and they were all gathered by one particular garage--for a drink. In some ways, the Mommy Group was helpful. My neighbors and I commisserated about unsolicited advice. My favorite neighbor revealed that her mother has a Trumpian way of slipping unwanted feedback into a chat: " They say that  little girls should never wear nail polish....for health reasons...." My neighbor's standard response is to rip out chunks of her own hair while screaming: "WHO???? Who are THEY??????" On the other hand, I can see how a Mommy Group isn't ideal. The topic shifted to po...

  I often think about neighbors, now that I live in the burbs.  Neighboring is a tricky thing. You have to be kind to the person next-door, because you may see that person daily for thirty or forty years. At the same time, you don't have family ties, family resemblance, to help paper over any tension. The person next-door is neither someone you chose nor someone you shared your childhood with. Recently, my new neighbors began a regular routine of blocking my access to my garage. This is a problem because I need to drive my son to and from various appointments. But it's not catastrophic; it's not difficult to put on a friendly face and ask for the truck to move. At the same time, a part of me seems weirdly gratified by the drama; I feel excited when I discover a new irritant outside. (Maybe this means my life right now is quieter than it should be.) I think of this in relation to a movie I very much like, which is "Neighbors," starring Rose Byrne. The idea is that ...