Neighbors Trying to Take Care of a Lake

“Grow up. It’s just politics.” He said. It goes over and over in my head.

I never thought of it as politics. I mean, I guess I recognized that because I was running in an election, even for the HOA, I didn’t object to being a ‘politician.’ I would be responsible for my community, as I had been before.

That’s the word I think of when I engage with the LCC - community. 

We have one of two private lakes in Washington. Every summer, families can be seen cavorting at our two lake parks — paddleboarding, jumping off docks, the kind of ordinary joy that doesn't happen by accident. 

Our lake is clean because of the hard work and experience of volunteers. We have community assets, which include 5 parks that must be maintained, so we all contribute to a shared fund. And to manage that fund, we elect seven directors: three in one year, four in the next. We have bylaws and covenants that lay out, in ink, how we will work together to do this. 

That's all a board is. A tool the community built so the cumbersome stuff — research, budgets, maintenance schedules — doesn't fall on three hundred people trying to act as one. It's not supposed to be a battlefield. It's supposed to be a chore wheel. 

So when someone tells me “it’s just politics," or “we’re not on the same side,” I don’t know how to respond. I did survive the 2025 election; if politics is what it felt like last time, I can’t blame anyone for stepping back.

But I keep thinking: it's three hundred people. If we don't invest in our lake, in our neighborhood - who will? And the version of this I want isn't one where the loudest or most tactical voices take control. I want it to be safe and easy for anyone to participate: to run on their own experience, to vote on the merits. I want to connect with neighbors and build a community we can be proud of.

If politics is “the activity of settling affairs in an organized society,” then I cannot argue with the definition.

It just keeps turning over because ‘politics’ is such a strange word to use for neighbors trying to take care of a lake.