There was a certain neighborhood that I occasionally drove through. I didn’t like that neighborhood. There was no specific reason. I just didn’t like it. A few years ago, when the walls of our first house were bulging, we decided to look for one a little larger. One of the first things I told the real estate agent was not to look in that neighborhood.
I soon found that house-hunting is not as much fun as going on house tours. It is about as much fun as trying on clothes after gaining a few pounds. The houses didn’t fit. They were too little or too dull or too expensive.
One day, my real estate friend called and said she had found something. We dashed out to see it. She was right. It was the right size, price, and neighborhood. But it didn’t “feel” right. This was not easy to explain to her or to myself. By now, she was getting desperate. She said, “Look, there’s one other house that has everything you want, but it’s in the neighborhood you don’t like. Since we’re out anyway, let’s just take a look at it.” Grudgingly, I agreed.
When we drove up to it, I knew it was mine. The minute we stepped in the door, everything was “me”—the colors, the carpets, the drapes, the room layout, the view, and the price. When my husband saw it, he agreed. We signed the contract that day.
The neighborhood turned out to be perfect: the people were wonderful; it was convenient to church, school, and all my favorite places to shop; and it was five minutes, via a back road, to the highway my husband took to work. Later that summer, as I sat on my new front porch, looking out at the kind of view I had dreamed of, I realized that sometimes I misjudge people the same way I had misjudged that neighborhood. I don’t like them because I don’t know them, and I don’t take time to take a second look. I could miss a lot of friends—and a lot of opportunities—that way.
Adapted from Graham Crackers, Galoshes, and God: Everywoman’s Book of Cope and Hope by Bernadette McCarver Snyder, Liguori Publications (437788). To order, visit Liguori.org or call 800-325-9521.