This post is part of the online initiative Reverb10. You can find all of my Reverb10 posts here.

December 7 – Community. Where have you discovered community, online or otherwise, in 2010? What community would you like to join, create or more deeply connect with in 2011?

I was going to write about the blogging community. But then something happened that has pushed that to the back of my mind. And because this is what is on my mind right now, it’s what I will be writing about, even though it will go a little off topic.

I’m currently living with my parents, in the house where I grew up. We were never very close with our neighbors. I do think that was partially my parents’ fault, because they never really reached out to them. We were friendly with one neighborhood family but they moved away about two years ago. Two other neighboring houses were occupied by old ladies, one of whom passed away and the other moved into a retirement home. When I was younger I wished that there were more families living in the neighborhood. For my parents to connect with and for us to have other children to hang out with. This year two families moved into the houses that the two older ladies used to live in. One a family with two young children, one a man whose wife had passed away with his son.

I really liked that families had moved into the neighborhood, hopeful that my parents would connect with their new neighbors. I have only been back in the neighborhood for a few months now and have yet to meet the family across the street. My parents did tell me a little about them, though, and I was happy that my parents liked their new neighbors.

I hope that whenever I end up living next, I will get along with my neighbors. I would love to have that neighborly community that I never really had before. I did get a little taste of it when I was living in Heidelberg, and though I didn’t really fit in with the rest of the families living in the building as a college student, I really enjoyed having nice neighbors. Neighbors I also occasionally had dinner with or played board games with.

Today, the father of the neighboring family died. He and his wife have two children, aged six and three. He was scheduled to have surgery for a heart problem this week from what my parents told me. I don’t know exactly what happened, but I saw a body being carried to the car of a funeral home, so I think there is no other explanation than this awful one. Even though I don’t know the family, my neighbor’s death really got to me. His wife must be absolutely devastated, and I cannot imagine what it’s like to have to raise two small children in the wake of her husband’s death. I cannot imagine what it must be like for the children, losing their father at so young an age.

I mean I’m in my twenties, and I cannot bear the thought of losing my parents one day. I know that this also got to my parents. The neighbor was younger than both of them, and you just don’t expect someone to die in their early 50s. Yes, he had a heart problem, but if it had been so urgent, he would have been scheduled to have the surgery earlier, right? I never knew this man but his death really affected me. I have been very lucky so far and this – seeing a body carried to the car – is probably as close as I got to death in a very long time.

I don’t know my neighbors, but I know that there is a woman in that house across the street who must be absolutely heartbroken at having lost her husband, and two children who may still be too young to really comprehend what happened.

I find it all so sad to think about, and it reminds me how quickly life can be over, and when you don’t expect it. And that is something I don’t like to be reminded of. Today I was confronted with what is one of my biggest fears. Our neighbors have had the one thing happen to them that I am most scared of.