How to Build Community: Take them Soup

An excerpt from chapter 4 in my upcoming e-book #3 in my series

An excerpt from Chapter 4 of my upcoming e-book titled Connected: An Experience in Curating Community (it is a working title). I share these snippets as works in progress as you and I catch a feel for what is coming.

The third e-book in my e-book series is about my experience building community in Maine. It feels like a lost art these days of distraction and online living and I want to talk about it….ironically, here online. You can check out e-book #1 and #2 here.

Date coming soon for e-book launch and a community-centric style book launch party in Colorado!

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Chapter 4: When Community is Inconvenient
Story: Take them Soup

It was a cold and dark February and I was handed a complex bag of illnesses. I had a terrible bout of bronchitis and then I got bit by a dog. Shortly after that, I got the flu from my kids that took me down for six whole weeks.

My kids had just started school in the Fall. I had a slew of phone numbers saved as contacts that went like this: First Name, Kid name’s mom. The girls were finding their way with new friends, new school, new curriculum. And I will say this on repeat, once the kids get into elementary school, a village does make its way. Daycare, not so much (which is when you could need it even more). But elementary, it naturally lends itself to connection and playdates and carpooling. Elementary also is a waterfall of viruses and flu and oh sweet hell, lice.

I had hosted my first gathering at our home in Maine in the form of a soup swap. In the invite, I thanked people who had lovingly welcomed us to Maine. Everyone brought soups and we kept them warm on the stovetop and got to taste test them. At the end, you swap and take different soups home with you! It was fun, I highly recommend hosting one.

Back to sick season, I work from home, my absence due to a flu goes unnoticed most days. However, young kids are so astute and when my kids were home sick from school, their young friends noticed.

Every home in New England has a front door no one uses and a side door everyone uses. One day, a brown bag of goods arrived on the porch steps of said side door. After receiving a text from my new friend, Jaime (saved in my contacts as Jaime-McKenzie Mama), had dropped off sourdough bread, mac n cheese, soups and a salad, in hopes to support dinner that evening for one tired, sick mama.

I cried.

I have had a meal train once when I had my second child and that was so thoughtful. But I have never had someone drop off soup when I had the flu. NEVER. And Jaime and I were newer friends, what is this community frequency?

I had met another woman, Paige who lived in town through a friend in Colorado via e-mail. A nod to tech being a cool space for intentional connection. It was one of those kismet introductions because that same woman helped me find a daycare I enrolled my youngest child in and she also was the first person I met for coffee in Maine. Almost every week after, we met for coffee. She was from Texas, like me. And we were both entrepreneurs with a desire to get out of the house more and live on screens less. Sometimes the connection will feel kismet.

Same week different day, Paige dropped off her entire baby blue soup pot on my front door filled to the brim with a sweet potato soup and next to it, a mason jar of roasted pepitas. She had made us all dinner to help out and the soup lasted for days.

Something I don’t think we do anymore as a society and I would highly recommend bringing back is knocking on your neighbor’s door and introducing yourself. Pretend you need a tablespoon of salt and go say hello. Because fast forward a few more days, my 70-something year old neighbor, Nancy, had texted me to see if she could meet the kids at the school bus to they could go bake cookies at her house. We had met upon arriving to Maine as she was great cousins with a past client and now good friend of our family. Wouldn’t you know, we moved to the same road as her. She didn’t have grandkids and upon meeting my three daughters, she said she would like to be around young kids more. As a tired mother who did not live near the kids’ beloved and adoring grandmothers, I said let me know when you want to see them … any time. I responded that day to her text and told her we had all been sick and didn’t want her to get sick. You guessed it, a cozy coconut chicken soup at my door.

I never signed a soup contract to live in this town. Is this really what New Englanders do?

There was no official calendar in an app.
There was no request made from me. Truthfully, I am still learning how to ask for help.
They did not ask if I already had dinner planned.
They did not even ask if I needed anything.
Jaime, Paige and Nancy just showed up.

Unannounced.
Sneaky and supportive.
So right on time.

And that week, I learned how to be in a community.

Here is what I have to say about this:

Don’t be that person that texts ‘let me know what you need’ when people are sick or sad or tender. Because people that are sick or sad or tender do not know what they need and often will never ask for help. Be the person that shows up. Show up unannounced with soup or a bundt cake or anything and leave it on the front porch. Show up with a card your kid made or that you made, yes, you can still draw cards, too. Show up imperfect without knowing the exact allergies or if the baby is sleeping at that exact moment - because you care more than niceties right now. And I am sure you know this but if you do not, it does not have to be homemade or handmade, the experience in community only has to be heartmade.

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