Like the wind, she was off.
Freshly released from her leash, our family dog went bounding down the hill and straight into the yard of the house next door.
She was free and exuberant – and a frightening sight to the neighbors.
My father ambled his way into their yard, apologizing profusely as he shepherded the dog back onto our property.
I was young at the time, and I don’t recall much more of this incident. But it’s hard not to recall what was in our backyard the next time I set foot there. Namely, a tall wooden privacy fence hugging the property line.
The days of our dog making a jailbreak were over. And so was the world as I knew it.
Good fences make good neighbors.
That’s about as American a phrase as there is.
We’re a society obsessed with security, with boundaries, with marked territory. We boldly place our stake in the ground, proclaiming to the world what we claim as ours. Then we set up blinds to keep that same world at bay.
There’s no way to fend off all risk, of course. But a good fence can sure help.
There are consequences to all this, of course. When our horizon consists of walls and warnings, we stop engaging with all that lies beyond it.
We see our neighbors less. We rely on them less. We trust them less.
This happened to my family when that wooden fence cropped up on the edge of our yard. The neighbors became ghosts.
So close, yet so far away. It was jarring.
Over time though, I came to embrace this arrangement. I found sanctuary in the quarter-acre of turf my family claimed – and the mechanisms that kept it in place.
Our property. Our land. Our home.
The exclusivity was everything.
The whispers filled the hallways.
Rumors. Gossip. Innuendo about someone conveniently absent from the conversation.
Such were the realities of high school.
But about halfway through my tour of duty, something changed. Websites with names like MySpace and Facebook appeared. And we all flocked to them.
Suddenly, the whispers were old news. Living out in the open on the wild frontier of the Internet, that was the way to go.
We posted too much of our lives there in those early days, and I was no exception. I didn’t always share what was on my mind. But just about everything else had a digital timestamp.
Personal photos. Status updates. Conversations with my social circle.
As I moved off to college and found a new social circle, I was an open book. Literally.
But soon, I found myself pulling back. I posted less, and I carried an air of suspicion about me.
Some of this instinct was literal. I’d caught two young men trying to steal my laptop from my dorm room one day, when I’d left it unattended.
I chased the would-be thieves away empty-handed. But I felt exposed, nonetheless. Exposed in a manner that lingers for the long haul.
Still, this incident only partially explains my decision to fade into the background. There were other factors at play.
Truth be told, I’d come to feel a yearning. A longing in my soul to withdraw. I desired to add mystery to the whispers about me – until there weren’t any whispers at all.
Such was the credo of my introversion. And I was done ignoring it.
So, I steadied the barriers around me. And I piled them higher with each passing day.
These tendencies have only proliferated over time. I remain fiercely independent and loathe to share too much of my journey all that widely. Ember Trace is about as far as I’ll open my book.
Good fences are my companion.
Fences are a hot button issue these days.
Some want them built up — both literally on our nation’s borders, and figuratively around the enclaves that lie within them. Others want to take a bulldozer to barriers, bringing more of us out in the open.
It’s a dueling agenda that’s caused a giant mess.
I don’t profess to have answers for a feasible immigration policy or a more equitable society. But I just might have something for the mess.
The way I see it, this turmoil comes not from the balance of issues themselves. But rather, our interpretation of them.
You see, we tend to pick sides in these grave matters, and countless others. This is our right in a free society, and it shouldn’t raise alarms on its own.
But we fail to put proper boundaries around the positions we take. Instead, we charge into the yard next door with them. We proselytize our views. And we condemn those that don’t conform – sparking divisiveness.
The solution to this conundrum is some good fences. Barriers delineating where our individuality ends, and where another’s begins.
If we erect these structures and abide by them, the vitriol should die down. We might still abhor each other’s views, but we’ll at least be able to share a respectful nod as we pass each other on the street.
And that’s light years from where we are now.
Some years ago, my family ceded my childhood home.
My parents put the property up for sale. They packed up their possessions and moved into a condo in the city.
I had moved away years before. I didn’t pay the decision much mind.
But from time to time, I’ve thought about that wooden fence at the edge of the backyard. And about the incident that led to its existence.
Our first family dog was a bearded collie, full of joy and energy. When we walked her around the neighborhood, she’d tug on the leash with the force of an unruly steer. When winter came, she’d bound through the snow like an antelope.
Still, I’d never seen her run more freely than when she made that run for the yard next door. She was like a wild horse darting across the plains, unbridled and undeterred.
This is the image we seek when we express our individuality. We aim to make the world our oyster, free from the reins of conformity.
But that freedom is a mirage. When we step out from the pack, we must fight for every inch – all while defending ourselves against other doing the same.
Wild horses might run free, but they also must find sustenance and ward off predators. Runaway dogs might find the same challenges and dangers – or worse – as they navigate the jungle of urbanized society.
And we will surely find the same unsavory realities if we don’t mind our fences. We will find ourselves scrapping for survival, with no lane to sustain what we truly desire.
Such are the tradeoffs of individuality. Our views, our goals, and our spoils have limits. Divisiveness is the price we pay for exceeding those limits.
Sturdy barriers can shield us from this fate. They can keep us from crossing the line and sabotaging our own desires. They’re a godsend if we establish them for the right reasons.
Good fences make good neighbors. Let’s mind ours accordingly.