Taking a break from the details of my St. Louis trip, which is probably boring to most, anyway. I am choosing today to write about my neighbor across the street.
(I am writing from home, BTW, having returned less than 48 hours ago.)
I bought my little house-on-a-slab on Walton Drive in March of 1992. My then-12-year-old daughter and I moved in at the end of that March as single women. In my case, I was NEWLY single. It was uncharted territory for me. We had many adjustments to make, and we did. It was slow and hard work to figure out our new reality, but we managed.
My neighbors across the street were Fred and Sharon. Both were older than I, but neither looked it nor acted it. In fact, it seemed to me that, as the years passed, I was the one who was aging. They never did.
I was still teaching then, and Megan was in 7th grade. I was running full tilt to keep up with job and kid and house, meals, laundry, cleaning, and (of course) the lawn. Over time, I came to know Sharon and Fred, casually.
More time passed. I had cats. If I needed to be at my dad's in Illinois, Fred would come in and feed the felines. They got a cat. I occasionally watched over Binkers so they could take a trip or two. We also collected each other's mail in our absences. We had traded house keys. And so it went.
My daughter eventually got married and had two children, then she divorced her husband and moved in with me, with the kids, for awhile. She and I remodeled the house to make room for everyone to have their own room. Then they all moved out. I was alone, so I made up a sheet of contacts for everyone to have should something happen to me. Fred and Sharon got one of those.
Fred seemed to know all of the neighbors, or knew of the neighbors, and whatever was going on in the neighborhood. It became a bit of a family joke at my house that "Freddie knows all!" He would see a service van in my driveway and ask what was going on. One time, when my sister was visiting, I had to call the paramedics for her. Fred walked in the front door--much to the shock of the paramedics--to figure out if help was needed. He began to call himself my "Nosy Neighbor".
As I became less and less able to do things due to health issues, Fred would take my trash cans to the street on trash day and bring them back after the trash truck had passed. Every day, he would pick up my mail and stick it in between my front doors, sometimes commenting on what was there. "Your car license sticker is here. Want me to put it on your license plate for you?" "Here's your water bill. If it hasn't gone down, you need to call them." He just wanted to alert me to special mails, and you know what? Yeah, it was "nosy" perhaps, but it showed me that I wasn't alone. I never asked him to do those things. He just did them out of the goodness of his heart.
One time, not so very long ago, Fred was knocking on my door for some reason, and he knew I was home because my car was in the drive. He went home, got my house key, and came in to check on me. I was napping in the garage bedroom and hadn't heard his knocks. Next thing I know, he was patting my hand and asking me if I was okay. I was. Interestingly, I wasn't even startled. Was I offended that this "nosy" man had entered my home to check on me? Not in the least! I was grateful to know that someone cared enough to check. That's the kind of neighbor to have when you live alone!
Another time, when my grandchildren were here, my grandson couldn't get the hot water in the shower to turn off when he was done. He alerted me. Fred was outside, mowing. I hailed him to come over to help, which he did. He found the shut-off valve for the water heater, unscrewed the screw on the hot water knob that was just twirling, tightened it, turned the water back on, and left. I felt saved! Thank God for nosy neighbors!
This fall, Fred had somehow injured his foot. He was restricted in movement. I found a kid to mow his yard for him, at my expense, in a very small way to pay back some of the myriad things Fred has done for me through the years. He called me after his injury to tell me I'd have to get my own mail, which I did. The very next thing I knew, Fred was hospitalized in ICU with COVID, even though vaccinated. I texted him to say, "If you were going to fall apart, did you have to do it all at once?" His responses were short. When I finally asked when he might be released, he said he was "in there" for the "long haul". Then he was intubated and on a ventilator for a month or more. His wife and I kept in touch. "No change." "Nothing new." And finally, when Fred was taken off the ventilator and he was still unresponsive, I got the word from Sharon on Dec. 10th that Fred had passed away.
This hit me hard. I was in Missouri at the time of his passing and didn't get word of the funeral arrangements in time to be there, but I feel a special closeness to Sharon, whether she feels it or not. We are now two women alone just across the street from each other. I was always closer to Fred but not to the exclusion of Sharon. I want Fred to know, posthumously, that we will stick together.
For 30 years, Fred was the best neighbor, nosy or not. I will miss him, selfishly. He is an angel now with rough edges on his wings...but an angel, nonetheless. May God be with his family--and me--as we try to manage life without him.
(Post Script, added after this was first published, I forgot a very, very important incident.) Several years ago in the early morning, I was walking to the bathroom, and as I turned the corner, my knee blew out. Instant, massive pain. I managed to hobble to get the phone and sit down at the kitchen table. I waited until 8:00 AM, then called Fred's house to ask him to bring his key to open my door, to come in and help me. Which he did. I had grabbed a "throw" that happened to be hanging over a kitchen chair to maintain my modesty, since I was only in a top and underwear. When Fred came in, I asked him to bring me my robe from the bedroom and turn his head while I put it on....then asked if he would go to the pharmacy to buy me a pair of crutches. He did, on his nickel, so I could get around inside the house. [I paid him back the next day.] I then called my friend and co-grandma Judy who took me to the ER, in a wheel chair while still in my robe. Over a month later, I had an MRI that diagnosed a torn meniscus. That's another story, but Fred was a part of getting me through the worst. And I will never forget it.)
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