Such good neighbors and friends

I haven't said often enough what good neighbors I have, but the latest episode of help from a neighbor reminds me to express my gratitude and appreciation. When I returned from my Christmas trip to Iowa, I discovered that the small, ornamental peach tree in the backyard had been blown over, with the trunk breaking off from the roots. Luckily, I had always kept it trimmed so that it wasn't tall enough to reach the sunroom when it fell in that direction. Although there is a chain saw in the garage, I wasn't about to try to use it myself. I wasn't having much luck finding help to get the tree cut up. Last Sunday and Monday when we had some unusually warm days, I went out with my pruning saw and some clippers and "denuded" the tree of its twigs and smaller branches. While I worked on that, my across-the-street neighbor Mike came over to see what was going on. He doesn't have his own chain saw and wasn't comfortable trying ours, but he expressed his concern and tried to come up with suggestions for what I could do. Then, at my support group Wednesday evening, I chatted with Debbie, one of my friends there, and told her what happened with the tree. Thursday morning, she forwarded three e-mails to me with names and phone numbers of people who would help me with the tree; she had posted a note on the Hilliard School District (where she works) internal bulletin board about my need and had responses within minutes. I planned to call one of those contacts today--except before I could do that, my tree was gone! My backyard neighbor, Todd, was outside about to use his chain saw on his own fallen tree branches but came over to my yard first. Not only did he cut up the remaining limbs and trunk, he removed everything and put it with his own branches to dispose of so I wouldn't have that problem to deal with. How grateful I am to him!

Not only that, on Thursday I woke up to a cold house; it turned out the computerized blower control board in the furnace had shorted out. When my across-the-street neighbor Diana saw how long the repair van was in my driveway, she called to make sure I was OK and to invite me over until I had heat again. It wasn't necessary to do that, but I do appreciate her concern. Likewise, my next-door neighbors Bill and Ann Morgan have brought me homemade food, check on me when they haven't seen me for a day or so, look after the house when I'm gone, and are always ready to chat and keep me company. Neighbor Sherry, also a widow, is always up for a chat, too, and always asks how Will is doing and asks to see his latest photos. They all make me feel so blessed to have them as neighbors and friends. I just needed to put that in writing.