On Neighbors

on Neighbors

I'm walking home from a neighbor's house, the one that is friends with my mom, the one that coached me with public speaking and got me to nationals as a kid, the one that surprised me with a scholarship when I graduated high school. It's a slightly chill evening and it's beautiful.

(We had been talking about my resumé and how I could improve it. We workshopped both that and my portfolio, and discussed possibilities of studies abroad, and swapped stories on things we missed from each other's lives now that I live hundreds of miles away.)

Now I'm walking home in the chill blue evening and I walk past my neighbor's house, the one with the chihuahuas, the one that over a decade ago rescued me when I got my pants caught in my bike chain and fell, trapped. Never met me in my life but when I fell in front of her house she came running out to help my small crying self.

And now I'm walking past my neighbor's house, the pale blue one on the corner, the neighbor that had a tire swing even though she was elderly, the place my family would go on walks to when I was a kid so the kids could play on her tire swing while the grownups talked. That tree died eventually, and my dad helped her cut it down. She gave him the tire swing to take home to us kids.

Over there across the way is my neighbor's house, the one that is good friends with my grandma and paid me to water her plants whenever she went away for a week. I see her husband from time to time out in the garage when I pass their place.

Over just a little bit farther is the orange house that looks like a castle, with the neighbors who had daughters just older than my sister and I, daughters who always gathered up their old clothing into giant bags to drop at our doorstep so my sister and I could have new clothing. A treasure. Their mom came to my graduation and got me a gift.

Now I'm walking down the road and there are the neighbors right next to us, with the small loud dogs, the neighbors that know my dad well. He always has my brothers over to do yard work and the such. Dad loves sending over the boys to collect leaves in the autumn from our neighbors - most of them are elderly and can use the help, and my dad collects truckfuls of leaves to compost for his garden. A win-win.

And there at the end, of course, are my neighbors who always loved to see us each Halloween. They were always prepared for us, always the first ones we saw. My youngest brother always took care of their dog. When our dog got out, that neighbor let us know and we were able to get her before she got too far away.

We were generations apart, my neighbors and I. Yet that never stopped them from loving my family and me.

I hope they know the fond love I have for them now, despite no longer living there.