Lately we’ve noticed the usual springtime glut of real estate activity around town and we’d like to offer our very welcome new residents some tips for settling in. So recent arrivals, if you want to establish yourself as a real Wellesley-ite as soon as possible, here’s how:

*Purchase a perfectly lovely home.  Gut-remodel  it before sleeping so much as one night in it.

*Better yet, purchase a perfectly lovely home.  Tear it down.

*Send your kids to the school in your district. Rubbing elbows with the sort of riff raff that populates our public schools keeps things real.

*If you do send your kids to private school, frame it as a class size issue.

*Homeschool them?  I think not.

*Address your child’s elementary school teachers by first name.  They will address you in kind.

*Address your child’s middle and high school teachers by Mr., Mrs., or Ms.  They will address you in kind.

*Bid on something at a school auction that is completely useless to you.  The higher you have to bid, the better.

*Join a town committee.  Or three.  Community service means something around here.

*Avoid Wellesley Square on Wednesdays, when all elementary schools students are released at noon.

*Act like Natick is a total road trip, even though it is a contiguous town.

*Buzz down to the Cape mid-week without a moment’s hesitation to check on something or other at the beach house.

*You DO have a beach house, don’t you?

*Accidentally over-schedule your child.  Publicly tear your hair out over it for the rest of the year.

*Go ahead and run around in town in nothing but yoga pants and fleece all week, but don’t even think about leaving the house without one or more carats.

*Have a job that cannot be explained in one word.  You’ll need to discuss this one over drinks.

*Schedule business meetings at Maugus diner.

*Make friends in town and help them in business.

*Be blonde.  Be thin.  Being both couldn’t hurt.

*Wander to towns a bit farther afield and become shocked when your interactions don’t run as smoothly as they do at home.

*Join a book group.

*Have no idea where the nearest laundromat, tattoo parlor, or proposed marijuana dispensary is.

*Know exactly where the three closest liquor stores are.

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