Community building

Start with this: bring a baked good everywhere you go,
and leave it there. Host dinner parties. Then, host the kind of dinner party
where folks come over early and help cook.
Go to meetings. Be the person who stays late after the meeting
to help put the chairs away. Once you are known for
being that person, try also getting there early to help set up,
and say, hey, what if we put the chairs in a big circle instead of rows?
Go to dance parties, gallery openings, poetry readings
with the same people who are at those meetings. Ask them
how their children are, what book they’re reading, if they could recommend
a restaurant. Do not talk about the news.
Visit the grocery or bakery whose shop sign is in
a language you cannot read. Ask the person behind the counter
what their specialty is; order three.
Leave wine in your friends’ houses. Sing along
with hymns in church, with the jukebox at the bar, with the radio
when your car windows are down in the summer.
When you hear a good idea, tell that person that it is a good idea
and let them tell you how to implement it.