Election Day, 1994: at least two historic things happened: the Democrats lost a House, for the first time in 40 years. And my wife and I found ours, out in northwest Phoenix. This month, we pay off the mortgage.
It’s been a good home, in a quiet neighborhood – close enough to some things, far enough from others. It’s seen us through seven job changes (three for her, four for me), two churches, three massive bee infestations, and the Great Microburst Blackout of 1995. And three good dogs, faithful, fun, and true.
Many a neighbor has come and gone across those years, and we’ve enjoyed only intermittent success, getting to know them. A sample, on one side of us, is the family who, for several years now, has stubbornly stood off all our efforts to move beyond a “wave as you pull out of the driveway” acquaintance.
Not long ago, I seized upon an opportunity. Gazing out our front window, I saw the dad from next door hacking furiously away in the late summer heat at a gigantic agave cactus that sprawled across most of his front yard and onto no small portion of ours. Though I am no one’s first call for help in a botanical crisis, I instantly determined to do what I could to build our negligible rapport through common toil.
He grunted, as I helped him carry great wedges of cactus around to the side of his house. He monosyllablized replies to my questions and comments. At length, as our efforts revealed the sobering breadth and depth of the chore before us, I offered to call our yard man, to see how much he would charge to save my neighbor from this desert lumberjack project.
He shrugged. I called. The estimate seemed reasonable, and the yard guy offered to come the following day. I asked my neighbor if he was amenable. He twitched and nodded “yes.”
I sealed the deal.
Next day, I came home to find a smooth place in the neighbor’s yard where agave humongous had so recently reigned supreme. The neighbor was gazing on the spot, approvingly. This, I sensed, was the moment for bonding.
“Looks like they did a good job,” I said, fishing some cash from my wallet. “Here, let me pay for some of it.”
He snatched the bills from my hand without a word, spun on his heels, and walked away. Haven’t heard a word from him since.
This set me on something of a defensive edge. I began to note, with growing irritation, how rarely people say “thank you,” anymore, for kindnesses great and small. Opening a door. Offering a place in line. Carrying something heavy. Picking up something dropped. Yielding the last cookie. Etc.
It’s dispiriting to see how many people presume on the good manners of others. As if grace were not so much “undeserved favor” as some debt the rest of us owe to people convinced their needs are more important than ours.
My indignation at ingratitude was becoming a little obsessive by the time, one evening a couple of weeks ago, I rammed the back of the car in front of me at a stoplight.
My cellphone had gone off, loudly, and ‘d jumped a little, instinctively glancing to see who was calling – at exactly the wrong moment. I was slowing down, but still gave the guy in front of me a pretty solid jolt. He hopped out and came back to see what I’d done to his bumper.
I climbed out, too, trembling at the thought of my next insurance premium.
“It’s fine,” he said, waving me off.
“Are you sure?” I asked, apologizing, fumbling for my insurance card. “You’re okay?”
“Yeah, no problem. Forget it.” He smiled, jumped back in his car, and drove away.
Next day, I swung by a dry cleaners near work to pick up some accumulated laundry. The man behind the counter, as usual, was brisk and brusque as he quoted the bill. I didn’t have a good combination of currency: two twenties to cover the $29.53 requested.
He handed me back the extra twenty. “Close enough,” he said. And meant it.
The day after that, my wife and I stood in line at the bank. A manager walked over, as we stood waiting for a free teller, to ask about our dog. By name.
We explained that he’d passed away, early in the year. She expressed her condolences, recalling fondly the days I used to bring him along when I came through the drive-through lane. She had been one of the tellers herself, back then, and enjoyed sending our pup treats along with my withdrawals.
“He was such a cutie,” she smiled.
A few days later, we received notice in the mail that the bank had made a donation in our dog’s name to a tree-planting charity. He’d have liked that.
So, I am immersed again in the periodic process of scrubbing the accumulated cynicism from my soul. Like Blanche DuBois, I'm re-realizing that “I have always depended on the kindness of strangers.”
This Thanksgiving, I am especially thankful for a home, for the family and friends who have shared its hospitality, visited it along the way, or will perhaps one day grace its aging threshold.
And grateful, too, for those whose names I do not know, whose mercies and grace have brightened the hearts of we who live, and love, and dream here.
Amen