blast from the past

I was talking with a gentleman today who waxed nostalgic for the days when neighbors knew one another, when families gathered in the breezeways for their daily meal and sat on the porch rocking and greeting the neighbors as they walked by in the idyllic Norman Rockwell summer evening.

I wondered, does he know his neighbors? Does he want to sit and chat with them? The world is different than it used to be, different than the illusion the boomers were fed. I think of the movie "Blast from the Past" where the 50's dad played by Christopher Walken is shocked after emerging from his bomb shelter in the mid-nineties and describes the street he walks as populated with mutants. It would be shocking to see it all at once (and it was a rough neighborhood) but still, I wonder...