We Are The People in Your Neigbhorhood

Like many gen-Xer's, part of the memory space in my brain is devoted to 1980's television. I was thinking about a neighborhood association meeting that I'm attending (and dreading) tonight and I was reminded of a song from Sesame Street. It went something like this: "We are the people in your neighborhood. We're the people that you meet when you're walking down the street. We're the people that you meet each day". You have to sing it in a very upbeat way, like a puppet character would, to get the gist. Now, I can't get it out of my head. It's like a soundtrack to the day.
TV shows from the 70's and 80's are utopiac in that they portray this perfect place where everyone, of every size and shade live together in harmony. Everyone has a purpose. You fight crime, or run the neighborhood shop. I don't know about you, but I'm rarely walking down my street, and even when I am, I rarely run into anyone I know. On the rare occasion where I see someone I know (at the huge grocery store chain, not the neighborhood bodega), my first inclination is to hide or pretend like I don't see them. It's not like everyone, or anyone out there has much reason to dislike me, but for some reason, I just don't like running into people without warning. I feel like I need time to rehearse these types of encounters. TV didn't prepare me for feelings that can't be easily expressed in a word or facial expression. It did not prepare me for social anxiety or a general sense of being annoyed by those around me.

I think I can attribute my lingering sense of discontent to the fact that my real life has never really measured up to what TV promised it would. I'm not one of Charlie's Angels. I don't live in a neighborhood full of muppets. I'm not even a neurotic New Yorker finding humor in the misadventures of my friends. When I was in fifth grade. I just knew that someone was making a TV show about me, without my knowledge. I had myself convinced that all my friends were hired actors, and that there were cameras all around me. It made me a little paranoid I think. So if I'm not on TV, and I don't even like idea of people seeing me without my knowledge, why do my thoughts always find their way back to things I saw on vintage TV?

And that's one to grow on...