There was a man who lived in the house on the corner of Meade and Gunnison. He was tall and wore what I call gardener’s jeans; made of the denim that is more practical than fashionable. Everytime I (or anyone for that matter) saw him he wore these heavy work boots and, if it was cool, a big heavy brown jacket that somehow made him look very tall and very strong. Well, truthfully, he was very tall and very strong. He had this long, greasy looking dark hair that he would always have to shovel over to one side to keep it out of his face. More often than not he looked down and he never ever made eye contact.
I never saw him away from his house. I never saw him across the street from his house or even on the far side of the alley behind his house. At any given time he was no more than one foot away from his property line.
By all accounts, this was a man to be avoided. He never said anything. He never looked at you. He was as big as all get out and was probably the type of person you would never want to see angry.
But you know something? I’ll bet you a dollar (and I don’t gamble) that he was a very gentle soul. I base this on one thing… the most beautiful garden I’ve ever seen in the neighborhood.
See, though he never left his property, he was always doing one thing every single time I saw him outside of his house: he tended to his garden. Looking back, he had all the company he wanted in his trees and shrubs and plants and flowers. They were his family.
As an adult, I know he had to have experienced something awful in his life to become such a recluse. It’s neither normal nor healthy to actively avoid human contact. Life seeks out life – that’s what we do.
But like I said, his friends and family numbered in the hundreds and they were all within easy reach. His children were his small green plants, the ones that needed a little help because they were so small and delicate. His lady friends were his flowers that tantalized with their colors and shapes and the way they swayed in the wind. His buddies were his trees that were just as tall and sturdy as he was. They too needed no one else. His entertainment came from the “neighborhood kids.” By that I mean the birds and rabbits and the squirrels and the occasional ‘possum or raccoon. They’re always as playful and unpredictable and fragile as the neigborhood kids. He always made sure they were safe while they visited.
I never saw him do anything that didn’t in some way maintain this little world within the neigborhood.
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Bobo and I were walking in front of his house and I noticed that there was a for sale sign posted on the front lawn. Screwed into the cross post was a plastic container of information sheets describing the property. I just figured that after all these years he had enough of the Chicago winters and decided to move somewhere warm. At the end of the # of rooms and description of flooring and details of the new furnace and size of the garage were two words I had to read over and over again in disbelief… “estate sale.”
Sometime this year this gentle soul passed away and as I read the flyer I felt really really sad I never said, “hello” to him.
As far as anyone could see, this quiet gentle soul spent his life nurturing life. Nothing wrong with that.
