Welcome to the Neighborhood - Clothing Optional

I grew up in a small town in southern New Hampshire, back before the interstate was open. That’s right—before GPS, before computers and smartphones, when TV stations went off the air at midnight, and back when people still knew the names of the cows in the neighbor’s pasture. So I’m no stranger to country living. Our little town had the essentials: a small store with worn wood floors and gas pumps out front, old men who sat on the porch pretending to whittle while they gossiped, a part-time post office, a part-time library, a Chevy dealership, and a seasonal hamburger stand that served up greasy magic in a paper box. In that town if you didn’t know everyone’s business, you were either new or unconscious. That was a very long time ago.

These days, the whole area has been swallowed by the slow creep of suburbia. The general store has turned into just another gas station where you can also buy a soda and some chips for the road. The cows are gone, all the residents have matching lawn furniture, and people give you side-eye if you say hello in the grocery store. It's lost the charm that came from knowing your neighbors well enough to borrow sugar and your mower.

So in 2001, with retirement on the horizon and traffic jams getting longer than a church sermon on Easter, my husband and I decided it was time to get out. We packed up and moved north. Not “just outside town” north. Not “up by the lake” north. No, we went full-tilt as-far-north-as-you-can-go-without-learning-French kind of north. The kind of north where GPS gets confused, cell service is a suggestion, and if you see moose tracks in your yard, that's just Tuesday.

We ended up in a tiny town where there are more dogs registered than voters, the roads are barely paved, and folks measure distance in the time it takes to get somewhere rather than miles. The nearest "big town" has about 2,000 people, no traffic light, and a volunteer fire department.

People here are a particular kind of wonderful. They’re simple, hard working folk who might be loggers, mill workers, carpenters or mechanics. Many work at the nearby Ethan Allen plant or are health care workers at the local 16 bed hospital. Many are locals who grew up here, and some are retired folks who moved here to disappear into the woods. Their hands are calloused, their trucks are muddy, and they’d give you the shirt off their back—though sometimes you’ll wish they hadn’t. These are folks who'll pull you out of a ditch with their tractor and never mention it again.

Which brings me to the moment I met my across-the-road neighbor.

We’d just moved in. Still had boxes stacked in the mudroom. I’d made a supply run to the “big city” which is considered “pretty close” even though it's an hour and a half away, and features a Home Depot, a Walmart, and a Burger King that gets your order wrong in the exact same way every single time. It was a Saturday afternoon, I was tired, cranky, and just wanted to get home and unpack the slow cooker I swore I’d use this time.

That’s when I saw him.

Standing in the middle of the road.
Stark. Raving. Buck. Naked.
And drunk. Like, couldn’t-pass-a-sobriety-test-if-it-were-multiple-choice kind of drunk.

Not a little tipsy. Not “I’ve had a few beers and lost track of my shirt.” No. This man had been communing with the liquor cabinet in a biblical sense. He was swaying in the breeze like a pine tree during a nor’easter. I don’t know what he’d been drinking, but it had the effect of three fingers of moonshine and a hug from Dolly Parton.

As I slowed my car (because how don’t you slow down for a man whose only accessory is a farmer’s tan?), he cheerfully shouted, “Howdy, neighbor! I’m the guy across the road! Welcome to the neighborhood!”

Now, there are many ways to meet your new neighbors:

• A wave from across the fence.

• A plate of cookies.

• A dog wandering into your yard followed by an apology and an introduction.

This was not on the list.

He even pointed out his house, just in case I thought he was some kind of feral mountain man fresh out of the woods. “That’s my place—right across from you!”

Yes sir. That sure cleared it up.

Now, I’d love to say I had a clever response. Something neighborly like “Nice to meet you. I'll bring over a casserole... with a lid”. I didn’t. I did what any respectable New Englander would do in a situation like that. I nodded politely like I was meeting someone’s uncle at a funeral and tried to keep driving. What do you say to a man standing in his birthday suit like he's auditioning for a Calvin Klein ad on a budget?

But here’s the kicker: once he sobered up and found his pants, he turned out to be a fantastic neighbor. The kind who helps you dig your car out of a snowbank. Who snow-blows out your mailbox after the plow buried it for the 4^th time today, just because he had to do his anyway. Who shows up with jumper cables when your battery dies in January. And never mentions the time he greeted you wearing nothing but a hangover and a smile.

And honestly? That’s what I love about this place. It’s unpredictable. It’s real. It’s raw. One day you’re chatting with friends at the feed store, wondering if farmer Joe needs help getting his hay in on time. The next you’re waving back at a man who clearly skipped a step in getting himself dressed that morning. But it’s all part of the charm.

So here’s the moral of the story:
Don’t let first impressions be your last impression.
Don’t judge a man by his clothes—or the noticeable lack thereof.
Because sometimes, the guy who greets you in the nude turns out to be the kind of neighbor who’d give you the shirt off his back. If, you know… he remembered to wear one.

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