Ghost in the World

12th November of 2010

 Dear Cassi,

 

I had a conversation this week with an old neighbor of mine who moved out of the neighbor hood then moved back after finding that her new home was too dangerous. She wanted to show me her new home which was almost the same layout as my home. She had the place remodeled more or less with an emphasis on new lighting. I can't say much for it, but she was happy and that was all that mattered.

She put six sunken lights in the living room and I think two or three in the hallway. I can't say that this is a good way to make a light as it keeps the ceiling and walls darker. A dark home may look good in a horror movie, but you got to live in this place. I noted that the body work on the ceiling fans was a dark chocolate with the blades the same color. They were darker then the wood of the floors and furniture. Over the last fifty years woods have changed a lot. I think they were at their darkest in the 80s. This used to have something to do with the availability of wood.

Now days we can get wood in any color and most of it is fake wood. The bedroom fans had been made to look organic like fire hardened roots of tribal spears. Some people say it adds to the spice of life. I think they're just trying too hard.

Well, in the back yard she had six avocado trees. None had fruit and all six had to be cut back hard just to keep them alive. They had grown so large their branches tangled together making them into a big canopy. The trees had been sickly as if they had struggled to live under their own weight. My neighbor told me that she had six fig trees taken out because they had been too sick to give fruit.

You see a lot of that in California and for that matter much of the world. The bad economy has left much of the world withered and sickly. We over grew our means, and when the economy shut down it all fell into disuse. One day the dust will cover us like a gray blanket, and the rain will carry us away leaving the world barren.

After the tour my neighbor spoke to me for more than an hour. She's a grandmother now and a withered old woman with hard vertical lines on her face. On the left side of her mouth a tar stain from smoking stood out as her defining feature. She lived on my street before I was born and so we spent some time talking about my mother who died twenty-one years ago next month. No one on the block knew haw crazy my mother was. She had a hard life and died young with all the people around her taking no notice.

How many of us are ghosts in this world? My mother and I could have stepped off the face of the world and none would have taken notice for weeks. Like extras in a movie we walk along the streets as part of the back drop of the world. We all have a story, we all have an identity, but so many of us hardly exist. You got to wonder what the hell is wrong with people that they have tunnel vision, and they can't see the people around them. It seems like we all just turn away and forget.

In the end, I told my neighbor that she should get to her dinner because it was getting cold and took my leave. It's funny how she spent so much time talking to me, but maybe I'm a good listener. Then we might have had a few of the same problems. I can't imagine how this woman, with her children and grandchildren, would have a shortage of people to talk to. The world works out that way sometimes. I remember being in crowds of people and still always alone. Maybe those people were like faces in a painting: they look human but just aren't real, or they could be like veins of gold waiting to be opened with pick and drill. Either way, it's time for me to get ready for work.

Stay safe,

Richard Leland Neal