How to be a villager, Part 2: Two doors to Connection
What if our vulnerabilities are an opportunity for connection?
This was the question I had to ask myself over and over when I first moved to Denver, on my own, six years ago. It was the middle of October in the middle of the pandemic. I had filled my 98' CRV full to bursting with all my belongings and took a right turn onto I-5 towards a new life.
I distinctly remember the pure thrill and terror of setting out on my road trip - knowing that the unknown ahead of me was a full kaleidoscope of new experiences.
The girl who grew up on 38th Ave to those very friendly parents was now in her late 20s. In addition to the collection of clothes and picture frames and odd dishes, the little red car carried a woman with conflicting emotions. For all of my upbringing had taught me about the joys of creating community in new places, I had also been trained by my hometown's particular antisocial ethos. I knew that I couldn't practice the "Seattle freeze" in Denver if I wanted to develop a community.
So, when I pulled into the driveway of my new apartment building, tired and excited, I told myself "we're not in Kansas anymore Toto."
It was time to say hello to strangers.
As I walked up the stairs to the apartment I'd rented sight unseen, a girl with a cute dog started walking down towards me. The voice inside my head said, "alright, let's try it out!" And the voice outside my head said, "Hey! I'm Olivia, I'm just moving in. Do you live here?" She smiled back and excitedly responded, "Oh my gosh, hi! I'm Kathleen, this is Corduroy. Yes we live on the second floor. We're going for a walk but if you need any help unloading your car when we're back please let me know!"
With just that small moment of big courage, I set in motion a new friendship and apartment community I never could have dreamed up.
While I realized that my vulnerability could certainly be an entrance to connection, I also began to see that generosity had a similar effect. Some days I knocked on Kathleen's door because I was short a quarter. Other days I knocked because I had extra homemade brownies. Both felt like the same gesture — like different doors into the same room.
What I didn't realize that first day on the stairwell was that Kathleen needed the hello just as much as I did. She had moved in recently herself and was feeling the loneliness of a new place. My vulnerability — that small act of courage to speak first — was actually a generous gift to her as well. My willingness to be seen was simultaneously vulnerable and generous. The line between the two doors, it turns out, is thinner than we think.
The beautiful thing was that those gestures turned into weekly walks around the neighborhood, or dinners at the local cafe, or venting sessions on each other's couches. The vulnerability of our needs and the abundance of our generosities slowly built piece by piece into a real friendship. And that friendship extended out to the rest of our floor — with the guy who lived across the hall from me, and the girl who moved in next to her.
It wasn't just me anymore, alone in Denver. It was Kathleen, her boyfriend Mike and their dog Corduroy; and Steven and his dog Stryder; and Kristen and her dog Ace; and me and my cat, Big Fluff. We were a little floor family that had each other's backs.
Even though we've all moved to other places, those friendships remain. I won't pretend there wasn't grief in watching that little community scatter — there was. But the grief itself was proof of what we'd built.
And what we'd built started with a vulnerable hello and a generous response.
———————
That's what I learned on that apartment floor: vulnerability and generosity aren't opposites. They're two ways of saying the same thing — “I'm here, and so are you.” One asks to be seen in your need. The other offers to be seen in your abundance. And both, when met with an open door, have the power to turn a stranger into someone who shows up for the real stuff of life.
So when it comes to being a villager, knock on the door with the brownies. And knock on it when you're short a quarter too. Your vulnerability and your abundance are both entrances — to connection you didn't know was waiting.