49 Isabella

One morning, I drop off the car at the mechanic’s and hoof back home through some muggy gray stuff passing for air. I pass my neighbor Isabella on her stoop, watering impatiens. She is ninety-two and radiant in bright magenta pants.

Good morning, Isabella! Great color on you!

She turns.

How are you? I ask.

“Fine, fine. I thought I would water these. I don’t know why,” she says, gesturing to the flowers. They look a little sad: wilting, browning, on their way out. She considers them. Sprinkles more water on them. Turns again, slowly.

“But they looked thirsty,” she says. “So I’m watering them. Even though they’re dying.” Then she throws me a grin. “And so am I.”

But who isn’t? I say, and we both laugh.

Really, who isn’t?

I live two houses down on this modest and generous block. It’s a dead end in every good sense: a place where people come, raise kids, stay put, get old and die. In the 18 years since Chris and I first moved in, a small mob of babies, ours among them, had spilled out onto the street and morphed into toddlers, then school kids, then teens, all while the empty-nesters turned silver and happy with grandchildren. And then those grandchildren grew, and the empty-nesters became the old folks who chatted and kept their eye on the street, making meatballs for the block parties and cupcakes for the latest batch of children. Chris and I had said goodbye to some of those old folks. We had been to some of their funerals. I always knew there would be more goodbyes on this dead end, and sooner rather than later; that’s how it works around here, how it’s supposed to work everywhere. Births and deaths in equal measure. But his death? His? How out of whack it seems. Yet death is always out of whack, although I’m not sure why. Everyone knows it’s coming. It’s not like it never happens. Dying is all natural, so it must be good for us—the organic quinoa of life stages. Then again, even Jesus wept at the news of Lazarus’s death. Jesus! The guy with the power to reanimate corpses! He of all people knew he’d be raising his dead friend in just a mo, and still. He cried. So maybe dying is natural, but maybe the weeping is, too.

Isabella, I’ve decided, has the right approach. Given that everyone is fading like impatiens in the low September sun, we should all bend our faces toward the daylight. We should wear the purple pants. Water the flowers on the stoop. Look up and greet our neighbors. Live.