charlie

charlie, he's my neighbor. he is a 70-something, over-all wearing, korean war vet. he yells back at barking dogs. he honks a clown horn at passers-by. he believes that people who talk on cell phones are plotting against him. sometimes, b/c of some obsessive habit, he slams his back door so hard it rattles my windows. and he always seems to be breaking up glass or metal into the back of his truck. it's so loud that someone from across the street won't let him park his truck in front of their house anymore.

the first thing charlie ever said to me when i moved onto crescent street was "is that your cat?" juege was the last item i moved into my apartment and charlie happened to be standing on his porch when i was carrying the black furball in. i shouldn't say that "charlie happened to be standing on his porch," because charlie is ALWAYS on his porch. he is the neighoborhood watch, all by himself. in my nicest 'talking to an old person' voice i said, "yes! do you like cats?" and he said, "what the hell does that have to do with anything? he better stay out of my yard!"

after that first meeting i tried my best to avoid charlie when at all possible, mostly because i was a little bit afraid of him. but, it's hard to avoid a neighbor who lives on his porch. i decided to try again one day and called out,

"hey charlie! how are you doing?"

"what do you mean, how am i doing?"

i had had about enough of his being such a crab. i yelled back,

"i MEAN...HOW ARE YOU DOING? What do you think that means?"

I think he knew that i meant business at that point. so he yelled back,

"Fine, good. probably better than most people."

"GOOD. GREAT. Glad to hear it."
damn that charlie.

one day charlie rang our doorbell and asked brett to help him haul some items to the local antique shop. you see, charlie is a junk collector. he rides around town in an old rusted out, green, pick-up that boasts a "gore/leiberman" bumpersticker and has two orange flags that bob off the back, the kind that kids connect to the back of their bikes. he picks up anything and everything he deems as "valuable" from yards and curbs and dumpsters all over Grand Rapids. his truck is always filled with crap. but to charlie it's pure gold. it's how he makes his living. right now he has three old metal bathtubs laying sideways alongside of about thirty orange and blue crates. his stuff probably doesn't hold a lot of value to the critical eye of an antique dealer, but sometimes these guys will pick something out of charlie's truck and give him thirty bucks for it.

when brett got home from his antiquing adventure he was carrying a paper bag in his hands. "a wedding gift from charlie!" he said. we proceeded to take each item out of the bag with excitement and wonder. a small fake crystal clock, a cd from... china (?), and a lava lamp. we knew that it was probably hard for charlie to part from such treasures. we were honoured to have received them. we put them on our back porch to air out. you never see charile without a cheap cigar in his mouth.

i wrote charlie a small thank you note and put it in an envelope with his name on it. i told him that his gifts to us were our FIRST wedding gifts and we were very thankful for them. the next day i opened my front door and found a bag filled with canned food, mostly vegetables, and mainly peas and corn. this was the first but not the last bag of food i have found outside of my front door under my mailbox. each one smells like cheap cigar, but every one is received with a smile. i did not buy one can of vegetables last winter.

our relationship with charlie has changed dramatically since those first days on crescent street. now when we leave our apartment charlie blesses our trip with a, "have a good one!" when we come home he honks his clown horn at us...twice. we help charlie and charlie helps us.

charlie receives a government check each month. by the end of the month that check starts to wear thin. he has asked us for money before but never without the promise of repayment. he has made it very clear that he does not accept hand-outs. never has, never will. he has always repaid us. and he always leaves his trade-mark "thank you" outside our door under our mailbox smelling like cheap cigar smoke.

sometimes charlie asks us if we would like to buy any of his treasures. this usually happens at the end of the month. like i said, he does not accept hand-outs and we do not give them. we are now the proud owners of three red and gold sequined clown puppets with glass heads, and they only cost us 50 bucks. now, we know and charlie knows that those puppets are not worth $50. so, when brett and i came back from our Friday night dinner date and found a picture frame hanging on the hooks of our mailbox, we were not surprised. charlie's "thank you." we're going to put our wedding picture in that frame.

we love charlie. he tells us stories of war and travel. he explains how he's made it through life riding on the love wings others. and he's showed us numerous times how he loves back. it's true that charlie sometimes embarrasses us with stories of girly shows in foreign countries, sometimes he's grumpy, sometimes he's a racist. but charlie knows how to be a neighbor and he's teaching me how to be a neighbor too. one day i will miss the smell of cheap cigar smoke wafting into my open windows.