Many hands...

Nov 13, 2015
1 min read

They say that many hands makes light work.

Case in point. My family and I recently moved into a new apartment. We didn't have a lot of big furniture to move, but it was more than I could handle on my own, for sure. I rented a small moving van, and put out the word among friends and at my church that I was looking for people to help out.

The turnout was better than I expected. Not only did we have several people show up to help move, but they brought their own vans and pickup trucks. As a result, a move that I thought would take at least a couple trips (and a couple hours) was done, start-to-finish, in one hour. It was almost embarassing how quickly we finished. Thanks for your help, everyone. We're done.

As I think about Putnam's work, I realize that what happened to me was social capital at work. Because I am blessed with a rich array of social capital, moving was relatively cheap and easy. That's not just a nice network of friends. That's tangible wealth.