We ran into Chris at Kerbey Lane. He was waiting for his friend Sam. We were waiting for a plate of hummus and tabouleh.
While Chris waited, we invited him to join us at our table. We talked about our jobs and the economy and the neighborhood and about wildflowers and butterflies and the elementary school.
When Sam arrived he walked up to the table, and Chris introduced us. We shook hands.
“I lived on your street street two years ago,” Sam said. “How long have you lived in Westcreek?”
Trudy and I looked at each other with looks of surprise that quickly turned to mutual shame.
“Ten years,” Trudy said.
We didn’t recognize him. Not his name. Not his face. Not his description of his dogs. We recognized nothing.
We sit in our yard on our bench for all the world to see on every sunny day. Every weekend we dig in the dirt and trim our trees and woody shrubs and water our wildflowers from rain barrels that sit at the front corners of our house. We are outside all the time. We shamelessly wave to anyone who walks or jogs or rides or drives by.
But we didn’t know Sam. ?We recognized absolutely nothing about this man who had lived at most a dozen houses down from us for years.
Suburbia.