All of us want friends. Not business associates, parlor confidants or co-conspirators, but real friends. We owls tend to be creatures of the night, if only because we can see much better than others. In the evening, we see with our gigantic eyes the folks sitting on their porches, at restaurants, under patio tents, next to a cook-out brazier or by a lakeside. They are enjoying time with one another and becoming friends.

This sounds quite normal, if your family is from here. But what if they aren’t? What if you are new to Limestone County? All sorts of people are coming to our county, every day. Every single day we sell more houses here than have been sold in years and years. This has its pros and cons. This owl has eyed the lack of city planning. We now find county school management lamenting the lack of space even in the newer schools for all the kids coming here. Tighter classes and add-on temporary classrooms are mentioned.

If you are stuck in traffic, there’s a good chance you are stuck in Limestone County. More housing development does not come automatically with the road infrastructure, utilities, sewage treatment, police and fire protection needed to support the increased needs new home dwellers bring. We can all can call our county commissioner or city council representative to offer observations or support for various actions. Yet there’s something much more important, and immediately effective, we can all do now.

If your family is not from here, you need friends. Once, people would go to a new neighbor and offer a homemade pie, flowers, or some other “welcome” treat. What if the whole neighborhood is new? There’s a hint that some developers have figured this out. They have “community centers,” a building where those residents in the development can gather. But what if you don’t live in such a development? What if you are elderly or disabled or have a family member who has a disability? Who will reach out to them? When you get together with family on a Sunday, have you ever invited neighbors over? After all, they are “neighbors.”

I watched once as “the meanest man in town,” who’d done enough to win the nickname, was approached by a neighbor as he retrieved his mail. It turned out he was proud of his time in the service during World War II. He hadn’t qualified for parachute training in the second World War, but recalled how happy he was to have tried. He had a life, which came pouring out to the person I watched who spoke to him. What he suffered from was loneliness. His only response was to clam up, and “fight” imaginary foes and become a bad neighbor.

We read about how loneliness is one of the greatest problems in America today. We are on the verge of yet more of that here, due to the vast influx of people who don’t know each other and have no familial ties here.

What can we do for them? Many invite new acquaintances to their church, but what then? That’s like jumping from step 1 to step 25. Wouldn’t it be better to ask them a little about themselves, where they’re from, what they like to eat, if they have any hobbies? Why obligate them to make a yes or no response to a commitment they need to reflect upon. Why not begin like when you were young and met someone for the first time? Why not try simple, elemental friendship, with no strings attached?

Invite them to join you for dinner. One group we observed found that such invitations were completely enjoyable. The more the merrier. Whole blocks (or nowadays, cul-de-sacs) of people would be invited to drop by for a hamburger or barbecue. Neighbors got to know one another, and friendships blossomed from there. Sure, use the community center building if you have one, but if not, you have a back yard, a porch or even a driveway. Make a club. Have you noticed the almost endless array of clubs listed in the Limestone Ledger?

Or how about the local magazines, which encourage neighbors to meet and share their skills? Make a social group with common interests, such as knitting, sports, cars, reading. As was said in the military, when asked if an idea was worthwhile, “raise a flag and see if anyone salutes.” Dr. Bob Glenn, former president of Athens State University, founded a Sherlock Holmes book club. There is even a submariner group which meets regularly at the Alabama Veterans Museum. If the library’s bulletin board is true, there’s even a group of bagpipers nearby. Why not take advantage of Athens’s many restaurants, prominently promoted by our community? Imagination will make you friends, and friends help make life worth living.

I’ve got to flutter off now, as I want to figure out how to play a bagpipe using only wings.