So You’ve Bought a House in the ’Burbs. Here’s How to Make Good With Your Neighbors.

As more of you flee the cities for the suburbs, exurbs and not-at-all-urbs, here are some things your new neighbors would like you to know. When you marry someone, you marry their whole family. It is the same with buying a house. You buy the whole neighborhood. And the neighbors. Like in-laws, your new neighbors will be watching you. You screw up, they won’t forget. They will be talking about that time your garbage can fell over and dumped dirty diapers on the street until that diapered child is married. My neighbors are still giving me grief about the year we left our Christmas wreath up until March, a shame we wear like a brownish, crumbly Scarlet Letter “O.” The ways you can alienate your new community are endless. Making too much noise, owning aggressive pets, driving too fast down the street, cutting down trees that don’t belong to you, leaving major appliances in your front yard, acting like a total Karen, selling drugs out of your garage, burning crosses on your lawn—these obvious infractions will earn you neighborhood pariah status and, potentially, jail time. But even if you are not a jerk or a criminal, are thoughtful, kind and leave your major appliances in the house where they belong, here’s a secret: There is a whole list of neighborhood crimes you won’t even know you’re committing. Here are some: Gratuitous shoveling: Shovel your driveway, shovel the sidewalk on both sides of your driveway, shovel out the elderly person across the street. Don’t shovel the driveway of your able-bodied next door neighbor. That is virtue signaling and it will not be received well by the able-bodied owners, who have egos that you just bruised. The only time it is acceptable to shovel the driveway of the able-bodied is when they have a boat, pool and/or awesome outdoor entertainment area, in which case someone else probably beat you to it. Failure to wave: You’re walking down the street. Someone you don’t know waves from their porch as you pass. You don’t see it. Or maybe you do and you don’t wave back, or you wave back in an insufficiently enthusiastic way. The talk will have started before you even set foot back in your house. “He’s stuck up.” “Is that the new guy?” “Ya. He’s from New York, right?” “Yes. Of course.” “I knew it.” If a neighbor waves at you, wave back like they are a beloved relative risen from the dead.