Voyeurism

Tonight Judah was crying for quite a while after we put him to bed.  I finally went upstairs to check on him and discovered him wriggling around his crib in discomfort.  I picked him up, cradled him to me and he let out a long and wet burp.  Then he sighed in contentment and snuggled up to me, barely awake.  I decided that I would rock him a little while and make sure he went back to sleep.  

I walked into our darkened playroom which is next to the boys' bedroom.  There is a large bay window in there and it was after dusk, nearly nighttime.  The light was all purple and deep blue, that twilighty color that evokes warmth, security and well, dinner.  I stood in front of the window and looked at my neighbor's homes.  Everyone's house was lit up, people standing around their granite islands making dinner, kids doing homework in home offices, front porch lights on making each house look cozy and friendly. 

Our neighborhood has a touch of the Desperate Housewives feel to it.  Everyone is pretty nosy around here and we have more than our fair share of inquisitive, botoxed mommies.  Just this past week, one of my neighbors confronted me in a marginally joking manor and mentioned that she had witnessed a friend of ours boot in our front yard after a particularly debaucherous evening.  We had been drinking copious amounts of Jack and Patron that night and our buddy was quite worse for the wear.  Incidentally, so are our juniper bushes.  Puke is not fertilizer.  Regardless, our soccer mom neighbor was fairly appalled at the frat house antics occuring at our home.  Needless to say, people tend to keep an eye on one another around here. 

Anyway, as I stared out of the bay window into the evening, I found myself thinking about the house across the street.  A lovely family of four lives there, complete with two teenage boys that are all legs.  They are still fairly sweet, which gives away their age.  Soon I am sure they will be full of the swagger and bravado of most adolescents, but for now, these are just good kids.  I have heard that their mom has been losing a long, long battle with cancer.  On Monday, she came home from the hospital in an ambulance and all day Tuesday, I watched hospice workers come and go in the dreary April rain.  

In contrast to all the other houses on the block, theirs was darkened.  The only light shone from their front office, where I watched the father (I assume, I have never met the parents) hold his head in his hands on his desk.  I felt like I was intruding on an intensely sad and private moment for this family in crisis.  (I suppose I am furthering that intrusion through this blog post, and for that I am sorry, but I need to process this).  

As I watched and wondered with a heavy heart, grieving for this family I barely know, I considered Judah resting peacefully in my arms.  I am sure that my neighbors once held their young boys in their arms and thought about how blessed they were.  I am sure they never suspected that their athletic, boisterous sons would grow up and reach adulthood without their mother.  I guess the whole thing has made me curious and apprehensive about the years to come.  We really don't know how this is all going to play out.   My voyeurism this evening just reinforces that every day is a gift, that I shouldn't be so impatient for the future,and  that every giggle, fart and shnoot from the boys is important.  

My thoughts are with my neighbors tonight.