ABSTRACT
This chapter argues that a care lens has much to offer planning, public health, urban design, and community practitioners in suburban neighborhoods, given what it reveals about everyday life in public spaces. Encounters with human and more-than-human others for people living with dementia made them feel cared for in their neighborhoods. During go-along interviews, all participants said hello to at least one passerby they did not know, commenting on the nice weather, cooing at a baby in a stroller, or talking about the previous night's football game. One of the biggest socio-cultural-political structures that affects the everyday outdoor practices of people living with dementia is the ableist stigmatization of dementia itself. Care is an intersectional lens that can indicate to planners and other practitioners how and why people do certain things/take certain routes in public spaces in a holistic manner that takes into account the complexity of everyday life on decision-making.
