Chicagoing: Our Neighborhood

Our neighborhood has seen a lot of changes since I moved in eight years ago. The area has a mixture of folks that have grown up in this part of Chicago and others that have moved into the area to make it their home. (in front of Uprise Skateboard Shop with the skateboarder from Lupe Fiasco's Kick Push video inside checking out the pooches)
We are part of the latter group and before A and Ms. M moved in, I rarely interacted with those that grew up or lived in this neighborhood for over a decade. Actually I only talked to the three other people that lived in my building. When A and Ms. M moved in, we started meeting random dog people whenever we walked Ms. M around the neighborhood. Then the number of people we met increased almost exponentially when we adopted Mr. B. It seemed like almost everyone wanted to talk to us and ask us about our dogs. We went from only knowing four people on our street to almost everyone on our street. Now this really feels like our neighborhood, where we stop almost every block to talk to our neighbors.The great thing is that we meet people in areas that surround our neighborhood. Whenever we walk the pooches, people will stop us to ask us questions, show us pictures of their dogs (mainly pit bulls and other bullys) and even go into their house or car to bring out their dog. These areas, including our neighborhood, have a very diverse racial and socioeconomic makeup and we love the fact that because of our pooches we are meeting all sorts of people. Even though Chicago is very diverse, rarely do people venture out of their circle and we love how the pooches have introduced us to such a great group of neighborhood friends and other acquaintances throughout Chicago.