Most people do not mind having a house that is smaller and/or a car that is cheaper than their neighbours’, as long as they each earn and have more money than their neighbours, and, equally important, their neighbours know that.
And then one day you realise that if you want to be rich, you'd have to give away almost everything you own.
Now Miss Mapp's social dictatorship among the ladies of Tilling had long been paramount, but every now and then signs of rebellious upheavals showed themselves. By virtue of her commanding personality these had never assumed really serious proportions, for Diva, who was generally the leader in these uprisings, had not the same moral massiveness. But now when Elizabeth was so exceedingly superior, the fumes of Bolshevism mounted swiftly to Diva's head. Moreover, the sight of this puzzling male impersonator, old, wrinkled, and moustached, had kindled to a greater heat her desire to know her and learn what it felt like to be Romeo on the music-hall stage and, after years of that delirious existence, to subside into a bath-chair and Suntrap and Tilling. What a wonderful life! . . . And behind all this there was a vague notion that Elizabeth had got her information in some clandestine manner and had muddled it. For all her clear-headedness and force Elizabeth did sometimes make a muddle and it would be sweeter than honey and the honeycomb to catch her out. So in a state of brooding resentment Diva went home to lunch and concentrated on how to get even with Elizabeth.
The UmbrellaIon Bulbuk has bought an umbrella. “Knock-knock” – it is a neighbour at the door. “It is going to rain, Ion. Give me your umbrella, please.”“It is not in the house,” lied Bulbuk. It rains…Bulbuk is walking wet in the yard, for the neighbour to see that the umbrella is not at home. But the neighbour is not watching. He went in the village for his business.
It was lonely for a day or so until one morning some man , more recently arrived than I, stopped me on the road. 'How do you get to West Egg village?' he asked helplessly. I told him. Ans as I walked on I was lonely no longer. I was a guide, a pathfinder, an original settler. He has casually conferred on me the freedom of the neighborhood.
Consider a situation where we refuse to pay attention to the less fortunate people in our neighbourhoods. If every single person in the elite of our society will take care of at least one child, most of the street kids would be taken care of. Yet, we act as if it is none of our business.