A few months ago I fell into conversation with someone at a pig roast in Boston when I overheard something about Brooklyn. I asked if she was also visiting from Brooklyn, and by chance she was. It turns out she lived right in my neighborhood.

In fact, she lived on the same street as me.

I asked what house number, and she said 30, which is my building.

At this point I’m wondering if this is a trick.

Wait, what floor? The fourth floor, she said.

I live on the forth floor, too.

It turns out she lived in 4A. And I live in 4C, just across the hall. And I’d never noticed her before. We laughed about it and ate pork belly and drank beer together, and for a moment I felt like I’d won the lottery.

It was nice to meet a neighbor. I don’t know many of them, but sometimes I see evidence of their lives: a package from Edible Arrangements or some other mail order company I thought nobody ever, ever ordered from. So if I greet or even meet my neighbors, I know it’s not because we have something in common. It is only because they live right next door to me. There is no shared value, no deep personal connection. It’s very unlikely we’d have met otherwise.

Yes, I suppose these people, my neighbors, could be amazing. They could be lifelong friends that challenge me yet bring out my best attributes. They could be people with whom I could grow old and wise. But that’s too easy. They’re probably freaks. They’re probably sharks. They probably don’t floss after eating all the strawberries out of their edible arrangement.

In a recent survey, 56% of respondents said they don’t have time to make lasting connections, and that’s why they don’t know their neighbors. I don’t believe it. It’s just that they’re too busy nurturing lasting connections with people across town and across the world. That’s why they don’t have time. I’m sure if their neighbors were something special, they’d have met and fallen in love by now.

But neighbors are never special, or they’re never just special enough. I once lived right across from Steve Buscemi, and he’s a little too special. The neighbor connection wouldn’t work. Besides, he owned and I rented.

So we keep our lives separate. The only resource I share with my current neighbors is the laundry room in the basement—not exactly a sidewalk cafe. Laundry is a surgical operation. And people often forget about it, which means I end up having to touch my neighbors underwear before we get to exchange our first words.

Maybe that’s why neighbors don’t talk. Even with segregated lives, maybe we’re too close for comfort. Maybe they’re suspicious that I’m the kind of person who likes touching my neighbors underwear in the laundry room. In which case, they’d probably rather not meet me. I’m probably a freak. I’m probably a shark. I probably don’t floss after eating all the strawberries out of my edible arrangement.

A week after the serendipitous pig roast, I went across the hall to visit my new friend, but the conversation was strained. She was busy in her life, and I in mine. Our worlds had collided, but it was a collision of perfect elasticity. I later saw her in the stairwell but by the time I recognized her, it was too late to say hello. But she didn’t say hello, either, and I could tell she recognized me. Here we are, living together on the same block, in the same building, on the same floor. If we’d never met, the stairwell would have been a completely neutral encounter. Instead I was ashamed at myself and upset at her. I can’t blame her, though. There are only ten people living on my floor, and only one with whom I have eaten pork belly in Boston, but pork belly just doesn’t have enough sinew to hold people together.