The Guy Across the Street

Despite the fact that we have been in our home over 2 years, we don't really know many neighbors. Neither of the neighbors directly beside us speak much english. We wave, but that's about it.

Right before our ice cream social, we went door-to-door to some of the closer neighbors, inviting them to meet our state representative. In the process, we met "Kevin".

Now "Kevin" has always seemed nice enough. In his mid-fifties, lives by himself, waves to us sometimes, and managed to completely BURN his entire lawn over the summer, despite the fact that he spent several hours a week watering, fertilizing, etc. Not sure what this has to do with anything, just found it very ironic.

Here would be a good place to mention that we happen to be in the awful habit of naming some of our neighbors, even though we don't really know their names. The man to our left is "Hector", his wife is simply known as "Hector's wife" (Don't ask me why). We don't mean any disrespect, and I am not sure how or where the names even come from. I think "Kevin" was dubbed "Kevin" because Gretyl thought he looked like a "Kevin". But for whatever reason, I was sure he was a "Scott".

Unfortunately, "Kevin" would be out of town and unable to make it to our ice cream social, but he did introduce himself. And that is how we found out his name was actually Bill.

When it came time to sell Poinsettias for the swim team, Gretyl went over and knocked on Bill's door. He didn't want any flowers, but he did give her $10 towards the cause. I thought that was extremely nice of him. I kept meaning to have Gretyl bake him some cookies and take them over as a thank you. I didn't actually get around to making her do that until a couple of days before Christmas.

So Gretyl bakes 2 dozen cookies and burns all but 11 of them. So I take all eleven of the somewhat sad looking cookies, put them in a baggie, and wrap them up in tissue paper and put them inside of an extra special tin that I bought especially for his cookies. I make out a Christmas card and add a little note, thanking him again for supporting the swim team.

December 23rd, I send Gretyl over with the cookies. His car is in the drive, but he doesn't answer the door. We make a couple of wise cracks about him not wanting to open the door because he doesn't want to give Gretyl any more money.

December 24th, Gretyl and Kyle walk over to try again. I say okay, take these to Bill but DON'T go inside of his house (after all, we don't know him all that well). I walk away and then come back and look out the front door a few minutes later. No Kyle and Gretyl to be seen. Hmmm...so much for not going inside.

When they come back, Gretyl has $20 he gave her to check his mail for the next 10 days! So now, I am feeling kind of bad that we gave him only 11 cookies! And also because every time I send Gretyl over, he feels the need to give her money!! But okay, I get over it.

Flash forward to today. We go out to get our mail for the first time since Christmas eve. There is the nice tin that Bill returned, with a nice little note thanking us for the cookies, re-iterating the request for Gretyl to get his mail, and wishing us a happy holiday. Along with the note is a $25 gift card for Red Lobster.

So altogether this man has given our family a total of $55 in cash and prizes. And we have given him 11 cookies. I wonder what would have happened if we actually gave him 1.5 or even 2 dozen cookies.