Radical Hospitality

It was about 9:00 on Friday night and my husband and I were standing in the kitchen.

"Why don't you go see your neighbors? Go visit one of your friends," he said.

I looked at him. "You sure?" I asked.

"Yeah, go ahead. I'll stay here with Mark."

I jumped in the truck to take a quick cruise, grabbing a can of Coke on the way out. It was warm and humid and the air was fragrant; twilight was coming quickly. I drove up the road to Dan's Garage, but it was empty. So I went back down the road. Jane had told me earlier that Yeager had a lot of wood to burn and was planning a fire that night to get rid of it. As I went down the road toward her house, I saw Jane, waving.

I rolled down the window. "Hey, Neighbor," I called out as I pulled up.

"What 'cha doing?" she asked, walking toward me.

"Not much," I said.

"Then park that thing and get out here."

I pulled into her drive and parked. As I got out of the truck Jane looked at my Coke. "You want some rum with that?" she asked walking up to the front door.

I took a deep breath of the evening air. "Ah Jane, you're a good neighbor."

We went inside and she poured me a drink, getting a beer for herself. Then she showed me a book of sun signs and we looked up our days. My day, March 11, was called the "Day of Intuition." Jane's day, January 30th, was called the "Take Charge Day." We read the descriptions out loud, laughing and agreeing. I felt the whole week slip away.

We walked across the street to Yeager's and out back to a... HUGE... very Big Fish bon fire. He had a lot of dead wood and fallen branches to clean up. About five others were gathered around watching it burn.

Eventually we pulled up chairs and talked. Jane was talking about her softball homerun.

"I rounded the corner and looked up in the stands and there were a few people saying 'no' but everyone else, most of them, were just watching as if they were thinking 'hey, she might make it.' So I poured it on!"

I raised an eyebrow. "You 'took charge,'" I said. Jane laughed.