The lure of the local

Mr. McFeely ("Speedy Delivery"), in Mister Rogers' Neighborhood, leads a group to the post office to hand deliver their completed 2010 Census forms during the "Count Me In In 2010 Rally" in Homestead, Penn.

From Robert Whitcomb’s “Digital Diary,’’ in GoLocal24.com

Then there are other local glimmers of light. An example: In the past couple of weeks, some of our neighbors in Providence organized outdoor parties to honor a  couple of friendly (including to dogs) and very reliable mailmen in our neighborhood who recently retired. It was a joy to see such benign civic activities bringing people together.

But events like this are less likely today in our dispersed, suburban/exurban society, in which interactions are increasingly on screens. We make fewer opportunities to do things together in person.

Consider that we don’t shop together as much. I thought of this the other week as I strolled around the little downtown of the town where I spent much of my boyhood. Back then, everyone went to the village’s locally owned grocery store (accurately called “Central Market” and smelling of ground coffee) and the town’s only drugstore, also locally owned. You’d bump into friends and neighbors there. Indeed, you’d make friends there.

Both have long since closed, succeeded by chain drugstores and chain supermarkets dispersed around the area. While many villagers a half century  ago would walk to the downtown almost daily to shop, now pretty much everyone drives to wind-swept store parking lots.

I wonder if, when the COVID-19 crisis fades, whether pent-up demand for real, in-person interactions might help revive  small downtowns.  And after all,  malls and big-box stores at the periphery of the old downtowns had been closing at a good clip before the virus in the Amazon avalanche.