New York Times
A teenager accidentally moved to the Senior Living Complex. TikTok loves it.
When Madison Kouto, 19, moved to a new apartment, she didn’t think much about the average age of her neighbors. After all, after moving there from Oklahoma, she won a nice apartment in the city of Piggott in northeastern Arkansas. But for about a week in his new home, Kouto saw a previously unnoticed sign outside the 10-unit complex. “I was looking around myself to find out what I could do here. I saw a sign that says” Senior Living Apartment “and realized that I had moved to a retirement community. “Mr. Kouto said in an interview. “When I saw the sign, everything was clicked. It was after the connection she made through TikTok over the past year that she signed up for the morning newsletter when the New York Times Kouto arrived at the apartment. With Piggott’s Lori Parker, describe yourself to more than 65,000 followers as “Preacher’s Wife, Mom and Nonna.” The two quickly formed an intimate relationship by following each other on a social media platform and commenting on the videos they shared. “She just touched my heart,” Parker said on Sunday. “I felt like I knew her for a long time.” Kouto left home at the age of 17 after she said she had “many challenges” when she was a kid. In a post on TikTok, she said she grew up supporting herself. Parker invited her to Arkansas after she said in one video that it’s been a long time since she celebrated Thanksgiving with her family. Although those plans were unsuccessful, Kouto later met the Parker family in February. “I just fell in love with her family, and they were very kind to me,” Kouto said. Parker finally proposed that Kouto move to Piggott, about 100 miles north of Memphis. Parker and her husband Sean have four children. The oldest is 31 years old and the youngest is 17 years old. Kouto moved from Norman, Oklahoma to Piggott in March and began looking for an apartment online. There wasn’t much information about Piggott’s apartment, so when she finally found the place and signed a monthly rental contract, she said she didn’t think she was going to move to a complex for older adults. It was. “She knew I was 19 but didn’t say anything,” Kouto said of the landlord, who wasn’t asked to comment. “The landlord really liked me.” According to Kouto, although the complex was designed for the elderly, it was an “equal opportunity housing” and could not legally discriminate against renters. That is. Kouto signed the debt after sunset, but she was told she could start moving that night if she wanted. “No one will hear anything,” Kouto laughed and remembered what the landlord had told her. “They don’t really sound good,” Kouto said, which means that he can play music whenever he wants, even when he comes home late at night from his job as a nursing assistant. This is one of Kohout’s records on TikTok for many of the benefits of living in an apartment for the elderly. Before moving to Arkansas, Kohout said he had about 30,000 followers on his social media app. Since then, her TikTok update from the housing complex has received widespread attention, and her followers have exceeded 92,000. Kouto said he had shown some of TikTok’s videos to his neighbors and enjoyed deepening ties with them and listening to them. “It’s like having an extra set of grandparents,” says Kouto, and some of them check her, invite her to dinner, and even leave a snack at her door. .. Mr. Kouto said he had connections with neighbors, especially those who had similar experiences. “It’s fun to see how she’s overcome the challenges of life,” Kouto said. “She is 50 years older than me, but we have a lot to do with it.” For now, Kohout will continue to live in this complex and share her experience with TikTok’s followers. .. She said she wanted to write a book and would consider writing about what she had learned from her new neighbor. “They definitely have many stories that shaped my heart and touched my heart, and I think many people will benefit from them,” she said. “I was fortunate enough to hear them all.” This article was originally published in The New York Times. © 2021 The New York Times Company