Left of the middle…Living in Davis

Now that I’m a full-fledged davis local now, I’m beginning to notice stuff that I never really realized/cared for when I was exploring the university, being in undergrad, or the bumming about afterwards. The town has some quirks that are seldom found in other areas, even in California.

This town has an old-neighborhood feel to it, as some of the neighbors I lived next to over on Vista Way had lived there for 20+ years. They buy each other bagels on Saturdays and communally share meals together on occasion. You don’t see that nearly as much in the apartments or the dorms. In some respects, when I watch my former neighbors interact with one another, I’m sort of reminded of the latter part of Acts 2, where the entire Christian community lived together and did everything together.

Part of me feels that, since I moved into a relatively new neighborhood, the community aspect of Vista is missing (granted the Vista neighbors didn’t particularly fancy us living there). It’s a little tougher getting to know the neighbors as they’re all enclosed in their houses and only venture out o walk the dog and check the mail. That sense of “hey how’s it going” isn’t quite there.

To tell you the truth, I never noticed just how dedicated the town is to its bikers. I mean, I know that davis is the bike capital and all, but I didn’t really realize that there was an entire network of bike-paths all over davis until last year. To tell you the truth, this is part of the reason that I bought in davis. I like the fact that the locals are so in-tuned with not just being the bike capital, but keeping up that image. There are some pretty jacked up parts of road over by Olive Dr., but it seems kind of obvious that our bike paths are on par, or even have a slight priority over motorways when public works budgeting is hashed out. At my first FBC meeting, there was a sizable chunk of time spent discussing bike path maintenance.

Even though I bike recreationally and am getting used to sharing the roads with bikers when I drive, I still feel an overmastering hatred and waves of disgust from the frowning woman on a bicycle, who looks at you with an air of contempt as if you are the symbol of all capitalist, meat-eating, the enemy of the people, enemy of the planet, globalizing, capitalism with a huge cigar, just because you may have slightly blown her off course on her freaking bicycle as you drive by at 30 mph (even though you gave her almost a car’s width of space).

There’s still a lot for me to get used to, especially as I go door-to-door trying to get to know my neighbors better. For the most part the neighbors have been really friendly, although there’s still that asian grandpa/grandma diagonal from me that think I’m there to rob their house haha. I noticed them watching me intently through their Levalor blinds a few times (probably clutching the phone with the finger on the 9) as I walk in front of their house to check my mail. Haha that’s ok…I have a few years to win over g’ma and g’pa with my folksy charm :D.

Other than this little hiccup, I think I’m settling quite nicely into the davis community. Now all I need is a golf cart and a prius on my driveway so I can fit in completely.

Ok I gotta go check the mail now…time to look innocent.