I grew up in small town middle America, where the whole town new each other. We would play kick the can during the summer evenings, and the whole town was safe to hide in. Everyone knew sooner or later that they would have a kid hiding in their bushes or behind their shed at some point or another. Everyone said hello when they saw you and waved as you drove by. After I got married, I moved to my wife's hometown, where things like this didn't happen. She is from a suburb of Kansas City, and though I enjoyed all the amenities of living next to a big city, I always felt uncomfortable. So, after 11 years we moved back to my home town. It wasn't till a few days ago that I noticed how much living in that area had changed me. I never met my neighbors in KC. We would nod if we seen each other in the yard but never once did we have a conversation. They just seemed unapproachable, and generally not interested in becoming acquainted.
When we bought our house four months ago I made a list of things I had to do while we were moving in. I found that list the other day and on the very bottom it said: introduce yourself to your neighbors. I realized then that I had made no attempt at meeting my new neighbors. I would see them in passing and give them a nod, just like in KC. I couldn't believe that I had been so rude to people I had grown up with.
The next morning I seen my neighbor in his yard and made a point to go over and reintroduce myself. We had a pleasant conversation and went about our business. From then on we would stop and talk with each other if we were out in our yards, he would ask me if I had found anything and I would show him my finds. After a week or two I noticed that the house next to me had been vacated and a for sale sign had come up. The people who lived there were, lets just say, not the kind you want as neighbors. The next time I saw my new friendly neighbor, I asked him if he knew who owned it, it is an old house and I wanted to ask permission to detect it. He told me he owns it but is selling it because he is tired of bad tenants. I ask permission to detect and he agreed without a thought. I quickly thanked him and shook his hand. As he walked away he said, " I am surprised you didn't ask sooner." I thought about that statement and wondered, if I would of put in the effort to finish my list, I could of had this permission a long time ago. Then I began to think of how many properties I missed out on because I was to scared to ask. I get most of my properties to detect from people I know are related to, I have never had the guts till that day to ask an acquaintance or neighbor if I could detect their property. I will never be a "door knocker" but I now realize it doesn't hurt to, after a few conversations, ask if I can detect their property. I now have seven more properties to detect and and found that all of them were waiting for me to ask.
I finally got a few minutes to detect this evening after a hectic day of running errands and doing chores. I decided to go next door and do a quick scan in the neighbors yard. I found a 1917 wheat penny and $1.02 in clad.( Now the weather is turning bad again and will not get a chance to detect there again for at least a week, if the forecast is right.) I went over to my neighbors house to show off my finds, and he was surprised at what I had found. I quickly offered the penny to him as a gesture of thanks, he accepted it and told me that when he was a kid he had collected coins. He thought about it a second and said, " you know, I think I still might have some in the garage, come with me." We went to his garage and he climbed into the rafters. I heard "Here they are," as he reached for a dusty box back in the corner. We retreated back inside and set at his kitchen table looking through his old coins. I looked up prices for him as he told me stories of how he got each one. We soon had sat looking at his collection for over 3 hours, his eyes still beaming as he carefully put each one back in the box. I asked, " are you going to put those back in the garage?" He looked at me with a boyish youthful grin that I had not seen on him before and said, "no, I think I will keep them in here where I can look at them some more. If you don't mind, I would like to go out with you next time. I think I will start adding to my collection again, thanks for reminding me how much I love it." With that we said our good byes and I walked to the house feeling good about finally being home.
You can see the coin on my google plus account. Thanks for reading and HH
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