Gate guarded - against each other
Too many modern neighborhoods are, well ... not all that neighborly
Nancy Levy sent this link, which requires registration.
It's an interesting account of life in a gated HOA in Orange County, CA:
...Hopefully not everyone shares my experience with the guarded-gate community where I lived in San Clemente. Within these invisible walls, over a period of 12 years I visited the home of just one neighbor. For an exorbitant monthly fee the guard would not allow my own mother entrance because my phone was busy. As we fortify ourselves against the undesirable element on the outside, so too we are protected from individuality within. Homeowners' associations, instead of creating peaceful harmony and a non-threatening manner in which to meet those who share the street where we live, accomplish the opposite. On the four boards on which I enjoyed the dubious honor of serving, I witnessed consternation, condemnation and confrontation, sprinkled with refreshments and an overall unwillingness to accommodate varying opinions. It is virtually impossible to require that individuals who are as different from each other as the colors they might want to paint their houses to lose themselves in a sea of sameness and anonymity, which is in many cases today's neighborhood. Consequently, no one gets along. Trust evaporates when one man attacks another for his weeds and threatens a lawsuit. Never mind that the man is holding down two jobs to pay for landscaping; the CC&Rs state the yard must be complete within 90 days. To make an exception would be setting a precedent. But there is hope despite our identical roofing, colorless walls and vistas void of foliage; there is that occasional person who forsakes the fear of lawsuits for friendship. I now have the privilege of living next to Karen and Ken, a doctor and nurse who, considering that they operate in a world of suspicion and malpractice insurance, might seem unlikely candidates to extend an unhesitating hand.