Companionship

When you live in a city with people chock-a-block on top of each other, you'd better get along with your neighbors. When you do, the whole experience becomes so much richer. Plot and Duck have been lucky that way. Last night their friends Keith and Cheryl from next door downstairs, who are seldom seen because they work or travel all the time, came over after dinner for a cup of tea and talk about all their travels. This weekend they'll be in a yurt in Big Sur, then they're going to Hilton Head for a family reunion, and then Keith is giving software training sessions in Tokyo and Seoul and Cheryl's tagging along.

What makes this lifestyle possible? Well, they've been living in an inexpensive apartment for seven years, both making good salaries and probably living on less than one, while putting the other away for house-buying eventually. (They're the ones who lend the Plotnik family their apartment when they go away at Christmas.) They have no kids. The apartment is furnished. They love Saint Plotniko but they know they'll never be able to afford a house here, so they're figuring they'll eventually go back east where both came from, with a pocket full of cash. Then they'll buy themselves half of Buffalo.

Their landlords Carlo and Athena upstairs are also nice people, also from the Northeast. Plotnik is moving their Prius (well what did you expect?) for them this month while they are in Paris for a conference and vacation, while their kids are in Philadelphia with their father. That house is filled with cool people.

Above them, Roxie and Jason on the corner, who bought Carlos's old house and have renovated it completely, are from Texas, he Dallas, she Houston. They are great people too, except that their dog Lenny reminds Plotnik a little too much of Mischief. And Steve and Ann three doors down are also delightful. Ann's from back East, Steve's from L.A. like Plottie. He's a shipwright. You don't see too many of those anymore. Their big old house still has the original working gas-lit chandeliers in the dining room.

Ray across the street is still mourning his wife Pat, close to three years after her death, pulling his black Chevy out of the garage every morning at 7am to go to the cemetery and do whatever he does at her grave. Pat's mom, Mrs. Daugherty, once owned the house next door where Carlo, Athena, Keith and Cheryl live. Pat grew up in that house but she's gone now.

Ray's got a big belly but his arms and legs are getting thinner and thinner. His daughter says he doesn't eat. Plottie goes and talks to him every week or so, listening to the same old stories, sitting in that little front room surrounded by pictures of Pat and their daughters. Plot is pretty sure Ray doesn't go into their bedroom across the hall anymore -- he sleeps in his recliner chair in the living room. He's a good guy and great neighbor. But what can you do for someone who is determined to mourn to the bitter end?

Plot was thinking about this because his Mom could so desperately use companionship of any kind. She's the old lady in a neighborhood that is getting younger and younger and there isn't anyone to go across the street or down the block to talk with her. The older people that were her friends are either dead or have gotten older themselves and sit at home. The newer neighbors are either movie people or lawyers, who can't be bothered, or Russians or Armenians who tear down the older houses and put up these garish faux-palaces to deposit their wives or mistresses. The only people you EVER see on the street up there are Latino gardeners, Latino plumbers, Latino housekeepers, or, on weekends, dog walkers.

Lilian, Mummy P.'s devoted housekeeper, knows them all. They talk, compare notes, gossip. They know who's doing what and where everybody comes from.

But Mummy P. knows nobody. And, in the end, companionship is everything.