Today’s Globe has an op-ed column by Derrick Z. Jackson that — while it may not agree with everyone’s politics — makes some intriguing points:
Even though the average size of the American family has shrunk, the average size of a new home has grown from an average of 983 square feet in 1950 to 2,330 square feet today, according to the National Association of Home Builders. The percentage of new homes over 2,400 square feet has zoomed from 10 percent in 1970 to 38 percent today. The percentage of new homes with two-car garages has grown from 39 percent in 1970 to 82 percent today.
In a New York Times feature this week about ”living large” in the exurbs, a sales representative joked with a family that was looking at a model home, ”Lots of places to hide, aren’t there, boys?” It is mathematically impossible for the rest of the world to live like this. As the boys play hide and seek for a moment, the parents play out the fantasy that hiding from the reality of consuming a quarter of the world’s energy and producing a quarter of the world’s greenhouse gases is an all-American right.
Jackson finishes by urging us to ask “ourselves if we need that much room in the exurbs to hide from each other.”
I like this way of looking at what we’re doing with cohousing: not hiding from each other.