DEAR SOMEONE ELSE’S MOM: My wife and I moved into a house in what was long considered a middle class holdout, surrounded by neighborhoods that have been redeveloped into townhouses and McMansion subdivisions, which we neither like nor want to live in. We’ve always loved both the location of the older neighborhood and the classic Levitt-built homes that make it up, especially ones that haven’t had all the original features renovated out of them.

Ever since we moved in, though, some of the neighbors have been at the least very cool, at the worst downright rude to us. When I spoke with my father-in-law about this, he suggested the longtime residents are most likely nervous that the same fate awaits their neighborhood as what’s been happening all around them. They clearly love their neighborhood as it is, and the thing is, so do my wife and I. Not all young couples want the 3600 square-foot monstrosities that keep pushing out the more practical, livable older homes, which are getting harder to find in some areas, like ours.

How do we let our new neighbors know we’re not invaders, but people who value the kind of homes they also love? --- APPRECIATE WHAT WE’VE GOT

DEAR APPRECIATE WHAT WE’VE GOT: As a fellow admirer of older, more traditional homes, I believe I get where you’re coming from. I’ve also lived in an area where every fifth house was being mansionized, completely engulfing the original post-WWII homes that had raised a couple of generations of kids, just as they were first built — all three bedrooms, one-and-a-half bathroom of them.

It can’t be easy for your new neighbors to see what’s happening all around them, and it’s not hard to understand that they may view you and your wife as the latest version of block-busters, as your father-in-law already suggested.

I’m guessing the best way to prove you’re not one of the invaders is to go about your business maintaining your property, and being pleasant to your neighbors. In time they may come around when they realize you have some shared values. It won’t happen overnight, but hopefully you’ll eventually feel and truly be more fully part of your new community.

DEAR READERS: Please keep all those left behind in the Afghanistan evacuations in your thoughts and prayers. Many who aided the U.S. and our allies over the years are now in mortal peril, along with their families and anyone who provides them shelter.

Please also remember and honor the brave men and women who risked and continue risking all to help bring as many of the stranded to safety as they can, especially the 13 young Americans who gave their lives in the service of others.

DEAR SOMEONE ELSE’S MOM: My boyfriend is 27. When he was still a teenager, he was arrested and convicted of stealing a car. The story he told me is that he did it on a dare from one of his friends, who by the way is currently serving time for a much more serious crime. I don’t know the details, and honestly, I do not want to.

I really want to give my boyfriend the benefit of the doubt that his criminal act was what my mother keeps calling “a youthful indiscretion.” Also, as far as I know he has never since done anything even remotely criminal since, and I have never seen anything to make me believe that will change, but what he did still bothers me.

I know it sounds petty, but why can I not get past his past? --- NEED TO FORGET THE PAST

DEAR NEED TO FORGET THE PAST: Teenagers are not always known for being the best decision-makers. It may be that you never had to deal with some of the temptations and challenges many teens face, which might make you less likely to be empathetic towards those who gave in when presented with situations they weren’t mature enough to walk away from. It sounds like in your boyfriend’s case, he learned from his mistake and has become a law-abiding adult.

If you’re serious about making something of this relationship, you need to work on letting go of your boyfriend’s past juvenile action, or at least accepting it for what I agree with your mother it was, a youthful lapse of judgment.