May-December

It started innocently enough. A friendly, mutual admiration between neighbors, across the street, on a perfect Spring day, a neighborhood not unlike Wisteria Lane, only sitting atop a bluff, with an ocean view.

“You are always working so hard,” said she.
I blushed. “Not as hard as you. Look at those shrubs. They’re perfect. You’ve been out here all day.”

We were both happily married, though neither of our spouses shared our passion for yardwork. My wife thinks life is too short to not pay someone else to do such things. Her husband of 60 years, Ari, between his ailing hip and glaucoma, rarely goes outside at all anymore.
One day a few years ago, as I was planting some Montauk daisies, she snuck up behind me, tapping me on the shoulder, in a breathless whisper, “Some candies for you. A treat for working so hard.” Her eyes sparkled, her cheeks were rosy from the scurrying across the street. In the late afternoon light, she didn’t look a day over 70. As suddenly as she had appeared she was gone. “I have to hide from them. They don’t want me to leave the yard,” she explained in tiptoeing retreat. “They think I am crazy old lady and I bother people.”

“Not at all. They’re crazy,” I replied. “They” were Melissa and Charles, her 50 year old daughter and son-in-law who shared the large, modern house with them.

“Thank you,” she said. “You are so kind.”

I was kind, wasn’t I? Not like Melissa and Charles, locking up this sweet old lady and telling her she was crazy. She was perfectly coherent, not to mention a tireless worker. Exhibit A in her sanity defense: she appreciated the work I had done on the old cottage. Painting the house, putting up a mailbox with a flower bed around it, tulips around the lightbulb, daffodils in front of the beech trees, a slate walkway with an adjacent bed of sea grass, sedum, Shasta daisies and black-eyed Susans, a railing along the open covered porch with flower boxes. Mowing the lawn, trimming the hedges. She always mentioned how hard I worked, how great everything looked, and she always conjured the jelly candies, the round sugar coated ones of different colors. I was usually on some version of Atkins that insisted I throw such poison over the cliff, but they were a gift, and I had a weakness for them, as soon as I opened the lid, ten or twelve were gone.

Seasons passed, we planted things, things grew, and we trimmed them. One afternoon she mentioned a branch over the driveway, how nice it would be if I could ever cut it, as it was blocking the view of the sea from their window. If I did, she would give me $100, for the babies, of course. Darcy was quite pregnant with the twins. Why not, I thought, and said, but I told her sternly not to give me any money. But when I did cut down the branch, a day later a card appeared in the mailbox, with a hundred dollar bill and a long note…

“You are too, too, kind. Now, when we look out our window…sometimes we can see a little boat. You have made us so happy.”

An ethical dilemma. Taking money from a sweet old lady didn’t feel right, but neither did giving it back. And how would we give it back without blowing her cover, letting the tyrannical Melissa and Charles know that she had been crossing the street, giving out landscaping advice and dropping Benjamins like she was Puff Diddy at Scores. They would lock her up, she would never prune in the sunshine again. Besides, Melissa didn’t seem to work and Charles taught pharmacology. How could they afford their 1.1 million dollar house (thanks Zillow) without help from Ma and Pa? She was probably loaded, and babies did need new shoes, or would eventually, once they and their feet came out.

Victoria's New Improved View

When the babies came and we went walking, Victoria would sneak out to admire them, always with the candies, “for the babies”. Darcy had given birth to twins during her fourth year of med school, a feat that garnered her constant and deserved praise. But Victoria, God Bless her, still thought I was the meow of the cat.

“You are so lucky to have such a good man to help you with these babies. I see how he is with them, holding them, feeding them, walking them all the time.”

This implied that she spent a lot of time watching us, but that did not bother us, since she had already stated it outright. Their little section of the house had a living room facing our house and the ocean beyond, and there they watched TV, and occasionally, thanks to me, they watched a little boat go by, but if we were around, they watched us. Big Brother. When I first heard this, I winced to think of how many times I had scratched or picked or peed where I shouldn’t, thinking no one was around, but apparently, all she saw was the good stuff, digging and cooking and grilling and vacuuming and cuddling in constant effort to make this homestead a safe happy one for my family. And, apparently, she never saw Darcy do anything remarkable, since she never remarked on how lucky I was to have Darcy.

On Halloween, we dressed the babies up and hit a few houses, theirs included. I finally met Ari, the husband, who had disappeared for more than a year after a motorcyclist on a crotch rocket catapulted himself over Ari’s minivan into a telephone pole, a deadly collision of deteriorating motor skills and excess testosterone. The mother of the deceased even tried to sue Ari, despite multiple witnesses who saw the biker going “at least 80” on the two-lane North Country Road across from McNulty’s Ice Cream Parlor on a busy summer Sunday.

He was happy to see us on Halloween, though, and I was happy to see that he was my second biggest fan. “Look at what this man gave you,” he told Darcy, pointing to the twins, “you are so lucky.” In over a year I had never heard anyone say anything remotely like that, and, frankly, it felt nice. He also was a watcher of The McConnell Show. “I saw you throwing the babies. He threw them so high, and they were laughing, laughing. You couldn’t throw them so high.”

Turning to me, “They will play soccer, yes?”
“Of course,” I said, not wanting to upset the German. “If they don’t have the balls or hand-eye coordination to play any real sports,” I didn’t say.

Trick or treating across the street

Over the winter, a Noreaster blew down another big branch on our property, and we got a hundo in the mailbox for God’s efforts. Yes, we kept it. Daniel Quinn, in Ishmael, says there are two types of people in this world, the leavers and the takers. Darcy and I realized long ago we are takers and we are fine with that.

Finally, last weekend, I saw my chance to give back. Spring had finally arrived in all its glimmering glory, a day so nice that I was happy to spend it attacking the epidemic of dandelions on our lawn with my secret weapon, “The Weed Hound”. I filled up 6 five gallon buckets with dandelion matter, I weed hounded until I had blisters, then hounded some more.

The weed hound at work

Victoria snuck out to admire my work and my hound, as she had the previous summer. “I told him (Ari) what to get, and he brings me this.” Disgusted, she showed be a bulky device that the Spanish Inquisitors might have dug clams with. It clearly lacked the flawless design and efficiency of the hound, something a German like her could appreciate. “I told him I am going to hit him in the head with this.” Ouch! German humor! I told her again she could borrow my hound, but she wanted her own, and I told her again what it was called and where he could find it in Home Depot.

But, I needed to go to Home Depot, and what better way to pay her back and relieve some of my taking-money-from-old-ladies guilt than to gift her a weed hound. Which I did. I brought it to her door that very evening, around sunset, and I could tell she was so happy, she even gave me a little peck on the cheek.

The next day, in our mailbox was a thank-you note (expected) and $23.86, the exact price of the weed hound, plus tax (not expected). Okay, that was weird, it was supposed to be a gift, but she is old and German, so...
Then there was the controversial note, which I will reprint below and allow you to parse:

Dear, SWEET, Derek,

First, I would like to say, I am sorry, (only TODAY) for not inviting you in
(YESTERDAY!) I apologize to you for this. Thank you for your
kindness, we appreciate very much your help. From now on, this will be my
favorite gardening tool! Every time I use it, I’ll remember your
gesture.

I dare to say, LOVE, Victoria

Like with most cards, I noticed the money, and some words inside intended to thank, and tossed it aside. Darcy and my mother, who was visiting, performed a thorough semantic analysis. Based on the regret for "not inviting you in", and the timid “dare to say” followed by the bold release of “LOVE”, they are now convinced and telling anyone who will listen that Victoria is completely, madly in love with me, that the McConnell Show has become, in her mind, a trashy romance with Fabio as me on the cover of the DVD, shirtless and muscled, the ocean breeze blowing through my hair, brandishing my trusty gardening tool.

I, for the record, think she is just a sweet old lady who shares my enthusiasm for landscaping.
Still, I may focus on some projects in the backyard for awhile, just to let things simmer down a little.