We live in a residential neighborhood full of houses from the 1950’s and 1960’s, with wide sidewalks and tall trees. We have an elementary school two blocks in one direction and a vibrant little downtown full of shops, restaurants, and the library two blocks in the other direction. My house is a modest 1962 Colonial – definitely not the nicest house on the block, but definitely not the worst, either. Brandon’s landscaping talents have helped turn the yard into something special and we continually make investments in our nest. I am fanciful – the benevolent queen of my household queendom. If in my younger days I aspired to be an acolyte of fancy goddesses like Athena or Artemis, now I would be at the altar of Hestia. I believe that the more we show love to our house – in small ways like cleaning and feeding birds and watering our flowers and in big ways like making capital improvements and loving each other well under our roof – the more it loves us back. The more it protects and shelters us and casts a dome of honeyed golden magic over all of us who live here.

Our next-door neighbor was an older, widowed lady who lived by herself. She may have been the original tenant / owner of her 1950s-era house. Betty and I did not always see eye to eye. When my ex-husband and I moved in, we were immediately assailed by her requests that we cut down the gorgeous pine trees in our backyard because they cast too much shade. (These trees are 25 years old if they’re a day.) Obviously we refused, which did not deter her from continually complaining about them.

If leaves or yard trash fell in her yard, she would rake or sweep it over the property line into my yard, regardless of its origin. When Brandon moved in, he made instant friends with all of the neighbors, including many that I hadn’t ever met. He considered Betty harmless and often made small talk with her when they happened upon one another in the yard or street. I warned him that this would not alter her behavior towards our property and sure enough, one autumn Monday after he’d spent many weekend hours raking our yard, he came home from a long day of work to a disheveled pile of leaves and twigs on our side of the property line, all of which had obviously come from her trees. There were Trump signs in her yard and some racially tinged comments during Covid and a small wire fence that she put up on the property line so that the mailperson couldn’t cut across to deliver our mail. In a neighborhood that continues to upgrade, her house was frozen in time, with plastic over the windows and chipped stone angels in the small garden.

As the years went on, though, Betty became more frail and less contentious, and she developed an anxious dependency on her neighbors, especially Brandon. She would bring her cellphone over to have him help her figure it out, and once, when she was feeling poorly, called him to take her to the hospital (he missed the call and she was taken by another neighbor). We began to wonder about Betty’s longevity and sure enough, one morning, I saw strange cars in her driveway and Betty’s house was buttoned up, curtains drawn.

It took a few weeks during which we thought she may have been in the hospital, or residential care, but before Labor Day, a crew of Detroit junk haulers descended on her house. My home office window looks over her driveway and for several days I heard their radio, I heard them moving her furniture out and breaking it up with sledgehammers and throwing it into a large dumpster. They tore out old carpets and demolished the small, run-down greenhouse in the back where Betty had hung her clothesline. They took a sledgehammer to the little porch stoop where she used to sit, because it was uneven and broken.

And I felt horrible.

Betty and I never really got along as good neighbors, but Brandon’s gentle good care of her and his complete willingness to overlook her less charitable qualities made me feel a little ashamed of myself. And when I realized that she was gone, and her family viewed her home and possessions as so much junk, a melancholy settled over me. I understand that there is no right answer, sometimes, when a relative dies and one is confronted with years worth of belongings and detritus. I realize that in this neighborhood, and in this housing market, they need to get it cleaned and on the market. Betty’s house will sell quickly and for likely a nice profit, and we’ll get new neighbors (hopefully nice ones). However, I still feel distressed at how time is relentless. Belongings come and go – even homes. They don’t have feelings, despite my anthropomorphic fancies. But in some way it will always be Betty’s house and she will always have a hatred for my trees and an attachment to my partner and her nightgowns hanging in her greenhouse and her Christmas tree up in July and I hope that wherever she is now, she is home.