CLEVELAND, Ohio – It’s been quite the month.
Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine sent Ohio Guardsmen to D.C., to help Donald Trump quell a fictional crime wave, in a city where crime has only decreased since last year. Our rookie quarterbacks made national headlines, while a roster member was charged with domestic violence, the third this year. That’s more than any other NFL team. Cleveland City Council member, Joe Jones, will likely be censured because he doesn’t know death threats of any kind are wrong. The Haslams’ covered stadium plan was rejected by ODOT due to poor planning. Finally, Cuyahoga County had to pause spending on Chris Ronayne’s costly projects, due to budget trouble.
Oy. That’s a lot of stuff and we, the people, have little to no power to help, except for some smart voting this fall (looking at you, Cleveland Ward 1 – you deserve better). Our powerlessness leaves our disgust and mistrust unmitigated.
But what if we turn our attention to smaller spheres, where each of us has immense potential to encourage a little hope or create some joy. Everyone has personal arenas, where one person has great influence.
Take the little section of my street between the nearby cross streets. There are 32 houses, if you count both sides and the corners. I know only four of the households, but ever since the kitten rescue (see my 7/20 column) new ways to meet and engage have been cropping up this summer.
On a recent morning walk, a gal at the corner had just harvested a handful of cucumbers from her boisterous vines and offered us some. We gladly accepted and then promised future tomatoes. Our monstrous romas are loaded with at least 50 tomatoes, and you just know the lot will ripen all at once. She gladly accepted, as her own tomato plants were being slow.
A young woman bought the house diagonal to us last February. Although she walks her dog past our place every day, we hadn’t met her until the kitten adventure. Now that I know her name, I can add a little card to the welcome basket I’ve been meaning to make for her for six months.
Some weeks ago, our next-door neighbor invited us to her wedding. She and her mom watch our place when we’re gone, as we do for them. We’ve had many conversations, exchanges of food, loans of yard tools and then, this past week we attended the family celebration.
It was a unique adventure. We knew no one else at the party except her two brothers, whom we had met briefly years ago. Except for only a couple other guests, everyone spoke Arabic, Kurdish and Turkish. Fortunately, several also spoke English. A few women engaged us kindly with stories of how they knew the groom and explanations of the unique traditions we witnessed.
We met no one who was there for the bride. Her mom sat with us for the meal of yummy roast beef, rice pilaf, tossed salad, plus baklava for dessert. It was a privilege to be part of her special day, and we hugged her and her mom more than once. It’s very unlikely we’ll experience anything like this with any other neighbor. We’re thankful for the opportunity.
Not all of our summer of 2025 neighborhood connections have started off pleasantly.
Two curly haired dogs have insisted on roaming through yards not their own, including ours. No one is with them, so their poops remain behind when they leave. Last week, I was out front when they showed up. When they started barking at me in my own yard, that did it.
Now where I grew up, if a neighbor’s dog visited uninvited, we would yell, “Git! Go home!” and the dog ran back to where it belonged. These two blond bozos, however, had no idea what I was telling them.
So, I walked them home, yelling at them the whole way. Actually, I charged them home. By the time we reached what seemed to be their house, I was a huffing puffing mess, and they were beside themselves. I knocked on the front door, and the most pleasant woman answered.
Irritated and winded, I asked if the wanderers were hers, which she confirmed. I ranted about how the dogs had been desecrating her neighbors’ yards a number of times. She apologized profusely. I asked her to PLEASE keep them under control. I also asked if the dogs were chipped (they were!) so I finished with, “At least you’ll get them back if they get picked up,” Fair and true but not nice.
By the time I had huffed and puffed back to my front step, I felt bad about my sweaty tirade. So, I wrote her a little note thanking her for securing the dogs better (they haven’t been back since!) and for how calmly she dealt with me. I don’t know her name, but she now knows mine, as I dropped the note at her front door on my litter patrol morning walk this week.
Given all the new connections, the energy of this little sphere is looking up. Or maybe it’s my outlook that’s improving. While all the regional shenanigans are still unfolding, this stretch of street is kinda feeling like a little oasis of simple kindnesses, and that feels good. In spite of all that ails our country, we can be kind neighbors.
A simple front yard gathering is in the works for next month. Hopefully, all the known neighbors along with the unknown, can gather and connect over some simple food. I especially hope the gal with the two curly mop dogs shows up, but hopefully the dogs stay home.
By then, we’ll have so many tomatoes to share, everyone will get a take-home gift of homegrown goodness. We certainly won’t be able to solve any of the region’s woes, but we will have shared a bit of time and perhaps made a new neighbor friend or two, which in these times, seems like a very wise thing to do.
Leslie Kouba is a freelance writer residing on Cleveland’s West side and writes regularly for The Plain Dealer and cleveland.com.
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