Love Your Neighbor

Our neighbor died yesterday. Sam and his wife, Mabel, have lived next door to us for the entire 15 years we’ve owned our house. They invited the four of us over for dinner the very first night we moved in. That gesture set the tone for the relationship we’d continue to have: they were neighbors we could count on, just as if they were part of our family.

Sam was the sort of neighbor who’s always working in his yard, waiting for the chance to chat up anyone else who happens to be outside. But he wasn’t obsessed with perfection. He took pride in his lawn, yet didn’t complain about neighborhood dogs leaving a deposit on his grass. Pointing out places where the deer had chewed up his landscaping, he’d shrug and say “I guess it’s only fair. They were here first.” He gave our son his first job, letting Andrew mow his yard. Because he was a teenager, Andrew wasn’t always the most attentive lawn care provider. But Sam was always patient, always kind, even when he asked Andrew to come back and fix a problem.

I went out of town on a business trip once, leaving Mike at home to deal with car trouble that had cropped up at the most inconvenient time. He went next door to ask Sam for a ride to a rental car office. When Sam opened his front door, Mike said “I need to ask you a favor.” Before he’d even heard what that favor might be, Sam said “It’s about time!” He was delighted to have a chance to help, even in a small way. Mike and I have always lived away from our extended families, so we’re used to being self-sufficient. We don’t, in fact, ask for help very often. But Sam’s reaction was a good reminder that asking for help can be a blessing to those who care about you, not the burden we often think it will be.

I saw Sam the evening before he died. He was sitting in his car, cleaning off the dashboard. I was just coming back from a walk with our slow-moving, older dog. I was hot, cranky, and in no mood to stop and chat. Sam was a master of corny jokes, so there was no such thing as a brief conversation with him. I tried hard to avoid making eye contact. I didn’t want to be rude, but I didn’t want to stand outside in the heat any longer than I had to, either. So I tried to pretend I hadn’t seen him. I walked on by, without so much as a wave. Later, Mike would confess that he’d done the same thing when he came back from his walk with Millie.

The next afternoon, we heard sirens nearby and went to our front window to see if we could tell what was going on. When a police car, a fire truck and an ambulance pulled up at the house next door, we had some idea. Sam had gone through two serious heart surgeries; he’d survived an infection that went undetected for almost a year after the first one. He told Mike once “I am Lazarus, the man who came back from the land of the dead.” He was so grateful to be here still, so aware of how quickly that can change.

Mike, Andrew and I watched out our front window, hoping and praying together. A friend had come to the house while the paramedics worked on Sam, so I knew Mabel wasn’t there alone. At least half an hour went by before Sam came out on a stretcher and was loaded into an ambulance. We didn’t know then what had happened, but we could see that he was in bad shape. Later in the day, I spent some time with Mabel and learned that he’d fallen out of his chair while having lunch. One minute they were eating together–the next, Sam was on the floor and Mabel was dialing 911.

We didn’t know until the next afternoon that what doctors had suspected to be a stroke was actually a massive heart attack. More importantly, Sam had gone 10 minutes without oxygen before the paramedics resuscitated him. A doctor at the hospital told Mabel that she should prepare for the worst.

When I first heard the news of Sam’s passing, of course, I was sad. But it didn’t take long for that sorrow to turn to anger at myself, and at the way this world works. It would have been so easy to let Sam know I cared about him. Wave my hand. Say hello. At worst, spend a little time listening to his jokes. That doesn’t sound like such a big deal right now, but in the moment it was too much to give.

I am a 52 year old woman. I’ve lost a number of people I love–both of my parents, at this point, and many friends. I shouldn’t need to be reminded that you don’t know when you’re seeing someone for the last time. Yet that’s exactly what Sam’s death is: another reminder that you need to love your neighbor while you can. To cherish the opportunity, like Sam did, rather than treating it as a burden you simply cannot bear.

I know Sam probably didn’t think twice about the fact that I failed to wave at him. I’m not so self-centered as to think my attention was the most important thing in his life. And I know it’s better that Sam didn’t suffer. Mabel won’t have to watch him waste away. All of us can think of Sam as the big personality he was. No one will have to remember him declining, altered, something less than the person we loved.

But I’m going to miss my neighbor. This place–and our family–will certainly be something less without him.