Bungalow Courts & Synthetic Family
Lessons learned during the pandemic
It seems that we are on the tail end of the COVID-19 pandemic. Most large public gatherings have resumed and we’re able to see each others’ faces again. The official public health emergency is set to expire on May 11th. Life seems to have returned back to a semblance of normalcy, whatever that means.
But I worry about rushing to jump back into “normal” life. The isolation of the pandemic had a significant impact us. While I’m glad to return back to normal patterns of life, work, and travel, I’m concerned that we’re whiffing on a chance to take a few moments to consider what we learned over the past few years and how it might change our decisions moving forward. Today, I want to take a moment to pause and reflect.
The synthetic family
I still remember a day in early February 2020 when we learned about the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic being reported from China. We were in Big Bear with two of our closest friends for a ski trip. As we sat around the fire that evening and wondered about the news, we had no idea what the next few years would hold for us. Ultimately we came home and that next week the world shut down. Luckily we made it to Costco when they still had toilet paper in stock.
Although the pandemic was painful and stressful in so many ways, it taught me in a new way about the importance of community and close friendships. And while the pandemic seems to be mostly over, there is another health crisis of similar proportions roiling just below the surface: loneliness and isolation. I was reminded of this recently when I came across Ezra Klein’s recent interview with Professor Sheila Liming, about these growing levels of loneliness and how the structures in our lives are responsible. According to recent polling data, loneliness is on the rise. Some of these data suggest that young people are even lonelier than the elderly. The internet has made us more connected than ever, but has distributed our social capacity with a thinness that gives us the appearance of community without the substance and depth that we need to nourish us.
As the pandemic began to intensify, I jokingly renamed the group chat that my wife and I have with those two good friends that we traveled to Big Bear with “Synthetic Fam.” Along with a few other families, they became part of our inner circle. Having that community was invaluable during the pandemic.
Who’s in your synthetic family?
This is the first lesson I’m taking away: the importance of a synthetic family. A few years ago David Brooks wrote a piece in The Atlantic called “The Nuclear Family was a Mistake.” In it, he articulates the cultural forces that have led to our current insular concept of family as including only those who are related to us by blood. I agree with David this move is a mistake. Yes, our nuclear families are valuable in a special way, but we all need synthetic families as well, inviting those who are closest to us to enter our lives with a level of access that requires vulnerability and a bit of discomfort.
Structures and habits matter
The second lesson is to find ways to structure your life in ways that enable your synthetic family to thrive. It’s no surprise to anyone who’s been reading me for long enough to hear me say that what you do consistently is extremely important. Relabeling a text thread is one thing but to have a significant impact, you’ve actually got to change the way you live your life in the day to day. One way to do this is by thoughtfully choosing the location and style of housing that you live in.
Bungalow Courts: A love story
When we moved to Pasadena almost a decade ago for me to start my PhD at Caltech, we didn’t know a soul in Los Angeles. Thankfully, we quickly got plugged into a church and began to build a community. For the first few years, we lived in a variety of relatively unmemorable apartments near Caltech’s campus, but in 2019, just before the start of the pandemic, we moved into a bungalow court just a few months before our firstborn arrived.
Bungalow courts, a Pasadena invention, are a housing arrangement where a series of small houses are arranged around a central common outdoor space. I love bungalow courts for many reasons, but they resonate with me most deeply because they provide a balance between the privacy and isolation of a single-family home and the convenient community that is possible in an apartment complex or college campus dorm. In our bungalow court we lived right across from our synthetic family. Hardly a day would go by without us seeing each other or spending some time chatting after work on the common lawn area between our houses. When I was lecturing from home, I would often pop outside during a break in the afternoon with our kids to play with our friends’ kids for a half hour. The closeness of the houses created the possibility for many small points of connection throughout the day.
The structure of the bungalow court wasn’t without its sacrifices. The proximity of the houses meant that you knew conversations would be overheard in passing and noise would leak from house to house, especially in the warm summer months with the windows open. The shared lawn space meant that you needed to coordinate if you were going to host some friends outside and that toys needed to be cleaned up after each time they were used to respect others’ use of the space.
But the benefits far outweighed the drawbacks. Especially as young parents, it was wonderful to be able to easily spend time together with other parents and their families. And to pop over for dessert or to watch a TV show together after the kids were in bed without the need for a babysitter thanks to the wonders of internet-connected baby monitors.
Bittersweetly, we’ve since moved out of our dear bungalow court. As our family grew, we needed more space. Our other neighbors have moved as well. So it goes. We love our new space and are thankful for it.
And yet, hardly a week goes by where I don’t wish that there was some way for us to return to that sweet, close communion. Where I could easily borrow some flour or just barge in to say hello and spend a few moments together on a run-of-the-mill Tuesday afternoon. Where we would cross paths during the day or invite each other over for some dessert and a show after the kids went to sleep.
I’m still trying to figure out how to buy a plot of land to start my own co-housing community with slightly larger bungalows but with the same ethos of shared space. But in the meantime, I’m reminded of the things that I can do to create the sort of community that I so loved in our bungalow court. To have and make friends that I can drop in on with nothing more than a text to say I’m on my way and that will do the same to me. To expand the concept of family to those friends who might as well be. To bask in the beauty and messiness of living in the sort of community where we are close enough to know each other’s flaws and yet love each other in spite of them.
The world is filled with loneliness, but much of it is of our own doing. Many of us get a taste of what living in close community is like during our college days, but quickly forget and move on to chase the American dream of the isolated single-family home and the private yard.
I understand the motivation. I really do. There’s a lot that pushes us in that direction. But we should at least be aware that it is a choice and one that we should carefully consider as we chart a path forward for ourselves and our families. For me and my family, I’m convinced that the answer has to include a synthetic family and intentional decisions to invite others into our lives in uncomfortable ways.
It doesn’t have to be complicated. Start small. Invite folks over for a weeknight dinner. It will be inconvenient, it will mess up your schedule, and it will be complicated to arrange. But it will be worth it. Go small, just get takeout or a premade meal from Costco. Use paper plates. Just do it. You’ll be glad you did.
The Book Nook
Seven Rules of Power by Professor Jeffrey Pfeffer has been on my reading list ever since I heard him speak about the book on The Art of Manliness last year.
I enjoyed this read although I am still digesting it and feel a bit uneasy about it. Interestingly, from reading the stories from Prof. Pfeffer’s students throughout the book, it seems that I am in good company. From what he shares, it seems that many of the students taking his class at Stanford which formed the foundation for the concepts in the book struggled with the concepts.
The Rules
The seven rules that Prof. Pfeffer presents in the book are:
Get Out of Your Own Way
Break the Rules
Appear Powerful
Build a Powerful Brand
Network Relentlessly
Use Your Power
Success Excuses (Almost) Everything
Descriptive rather than prescriptive
While I’m still wrestling with these rules and how they might or might not apply in my life, I have found it to be a helpful lens for understanding the ways that others have successfully used their power. In this light, the rules can be descriptive even if they are not prescriptive.
The Professor Is In
Last week was the final week of classes at Harvey Mudd for the Spring 2023 semester. On Friday we wrapped up the Prototyping Your Mudd class that I’ve been helping to co-facilitate with my colleague Prof. Nancy Lape this semester.
At the end of the semester, each student gave a short presentation about what they learned in the class and a graphical map representing a plan for their remaining time at Harvey Mudd. We had a great time as a class hearing the students’ reflections. I love hearing how the students have embodied the prototyping mindset and developed an intentional approach to designing their college experience.
Leisure Line
Another weekend means more pizza. This weekend I got a special delivery from my folks who brought me canned tomatoes straight from Pepe’s for my birthday. In addition to the normal slate of pies, I made an original tomato pie. No mozzarella on this guy.
On Sunday, I made my birthday cake. Another classic Sally’s Baking Addiction recipe. Turned out pretty good!
Still Life
On Saturday we spent the morning at Travel Town in Griffith Park. Lots of trains to check out.
Thank you for this, Josh! As a nearly life-long Pasadenan, I have always had a fondness for bungalow courts. I never got to live in one, but when we came back to Pasadena we lucked into a street not far from many of them that had a built-in synthetic family as well. 15 kids aged 1-5 on half a block. Every day after naps we would congregate in someone's yard with goldfish and juice boxes (and a little later wine) and connect in so many organic ways. Holiday parties and vacation and progressive dinners were all part of the fabric as was the neighbor who stayed with the sleeping kid while you rushed the other one to the ER. It was the neighborhood that everyone thought no longer existed. It was a gift.