David and I drove down to Plano last weekend to pickup a laptop at Fry's. This entails driving almost but not quite into Dallas County. On the way in, we spied some gangland style spray painting on one of the over passes in Plano. It wasn't very big, but it was way more than we are used to in our relatively squeaky clean suburb.

I pointed this out to him and he was equally surprised.

The last time we were in the Los Angeles area, we stayed in downtown Long Beach and traveled the 710 (Long Beach) Freeway, which had a lot of graffiti. By that, I mean one entire freeway sign was completely obliterated with spray paint. 100%. It was illegible.

Most of Long Beach, and Los Angeles, is grime coated and dotted with graffiti. Usually, upon arrival at the airport, I go into scared adrenaline mode, from which I don't recover for several days.

At one time the dirty, grimy, gang-tagged neighborhoods were my home. It wasn't alarming, it wasn't a big deal. Now it is frightening.

Everything here is so shiny and clean. Even the old buildings on what people here like to consider the poorer (older) side of town are way cleaner than the neighborhoods where I grew up. Why is this? Is it because we don't have the gang element so much here as there? Is it that trash and vandalism attract trash and vandalism? Is it because here we clean up vandalism as soon as it occurs?

I believe in the concept of "creep". "Creep" is when we allow the little, undesirable things to creep into our lives - our homes, our neighborhoods, our workplaces - and we don't do anything about them. After all, we shouldn't sweat the small stuff, right?

Wrong.

Once we start ignoring the small stuff, more and more small stuff will creep into our lives. Small stuff might be neighbors not taking care of their property, or a little spray paint here or there, or a suggestive song or two on mainstream radio. When you have one or two little things creeping into your world, it is easy to have three or four things. Then five or six. Think of it like counter top clutter or junk mail piling up. Before you know it, it can be a large and dirty mess.

Think of it like cockroaches or rodents. You either have none, or a whole bunch, you have to decide what you want, and then defend your choice with vigor!