There are no flowers on the kitchen table next door today. In fact, there is no table. We don’t spend a lot of time staring from our kitchen window into the neighbours’ kitchen but our windows do overlook each other. Often as I turn from the fridge to the counter to cut up vegetables I notice flowers or a bowl of fruit caught in the winter sunlight that comes through their window. We have nothing as interesting for them to look at in return, just our stainless steel fridge door and perhaps a bit of our stovetop.
Yesterday our next-door neighbours moved. For the last 9 years we have had the best neighbours anyone could ask for. They got to know people in the neighbourhood that we have hardly ever spoken to despite living here for over 30 years. They were happy to fill us in. Since we are retired we tend to sleep late and countless times during those winters I drew the blinds in the living room to discover that the neighbours, who rise early to go to work and get the kids off to school, had shovelled the city sidewalk outside our house as well as doing their own. Sometimes we were lucky enough to be able to return the favour, but I think they cleared our walk much more often than we cleared theirs.
They kept an eye on our house for us and let us know when there was a package delivered if we hadn't noticed. They picked up the packages that arrived late and took them into their house for safekeeping if we were away for a few days.
When our garage door was open one morning in the fall they let us know and so we discovered that the e-bike had been stolen. We got it back the next day and our neighbours shared our relief. I often wonder how it is that I don’t know or see the things that the neighbours do. Am I just unaware or do I spend too much time in my own head to notice what’s going on outside the house?
During the summers it was lovely to wake to the sound of children laughing as they imagined worlds in the playhouse at the back of their lot. It was also fun to watch the kids on the swing attached to the ash tree in their backyard. There were conversations with adults and kids through the fence or standing in our front yards. The Easter Bunny from next door visited us with chocolates and a couple of years ago a sign appeared in chalk on the sidewalk in front of our house wishing us a Happy Anniversary. We sometimes left muffins on their step and we tried arrange to sing Happy Birthday to each of the family members.
It was comforting to live next door to friendly neighbours. The people who owned the house before them weren’t as easy-going. They didn’t like the way our eaves trough was put up. In the spring, snow melted beside our driveway and ran onto their property. Water does tend to run downhill but somehow that was our problem. When we got a phone call from them or when they knocked on the door we wondered ‘What now?’
The neighbourhood is changing. The property across the back lane that used to be zoned for single-family dwellings is now zoned for multi-family and retail. Houses are coming down to be replaced by x-plexes. The other family from across the lane who also deserves the title of the ‘best neighbours anyone could ask for’ sold their property and, during the summer, moved farther into the neighbourhood away from the busy street and the back lane traffic to and from the bottle depot and the liquor store situated in the next block. The offer from the developer was simply too good to pass up. Their house and the one next to theirs will come down to make way for an apartment complex sometime in the next couple of years. I hope both of our former neighbours love their new locations and that they will have good memories of the time they spent near us. I wish them many joys and neighbours that are as kind, generous, and courteous as they are.
Perhaps having many more eyes from an apartment block on the back lane will be a good thing, although I feel a bit of trepidation about what that will do to the parking situation and to ease of access to our garage. Perhaps the couple who bought the house next door will be wonderful neighbours in their own way. At the moment, though, I’m a little sad that we never had the drinks on our deck or the barbecue in the back lane that we talked about. We did have many other good times, so today I’m going to pause, remember, appreciate, and although I'm not Irish, offer an Irish Blessing which seems appropriate.
May the road rise up to meet you.
May the wind be always at your back.
May the sun shine warm upon your face;
the rains fall soft upon your fields and until we meet again,
may God hold you in the palm of His hand.
