Musings on life in the commune

A neighbor in Florida who was on the condo board had a palm tree removed last year because it was blocking her view.
The rest of the board pointed out that she wasn’t allowed to do that and ultimately billed her for the cost of its replacement.  

          Our next-door neighbor was on the next iteration of the board and was an excellent addition, financially savvy and hard-working. Of course, his wife did feed the wildlife twice daily outside her porch in spite of strict rules prohibiting that, and since our porch was next to theirs, we also reaped the rewards of noise and bird poop.

          So, we’ve had our ups and downs. This year we have basically a new board.  We’ll see how this new set of people do.

          It’s actually kind of amazing that anyone wants to serve. It’s really counter-intuitive. The very nature of condo living is premised on the idea that people will want to have less responsibility, not more. The typical resident is retired, and many have sold the big house with its grass mowing, snow blowing, and general repairs, and those serving on a board are no different.

 A condo board is basically a village council, managing life for, in our case, over 140 units. They can’t escape their constituents either, since board members live there too, and a walk around the complex can sometimes turn into a session of fielding requests and concerns on foot, not to mention endless phone calls.

It’s an adjustment, switching from an autonomous life on your own plot of land to shared ownership. We may each own our own unit, but the value of that unit and our quality of life rises or falls with the decisions made by this group of 4 or 5 people.

Perhaps board members aren’t just great humanitarians; perhaps they’re also watching out for their own best interests. Since those most likely will benefit me too, I guess that suits me just fine as long as no one decides on her own to lop down another tree.