Being a Good Neighbor

As a follower of Christ Jesus I endeavor to live by the Golden Rule — treat others as you would want to be treated. Now I have to be the first to admit that I don’t always live up to that example but it is a practice that I have made a part of my daily life. So I want to be a good neighbor in the blog world by thanking La Shawn Barber for her kindness and consideration to little bloggers like myself. Yesterday she kindly link to an article I wrote about embryonic stem cell research and its connection with the pro-abortion on demand crowd. Because of that link I have received over 80 visitors to my blog since yesterday! I received a couple of nice comments and e-mails regarding my article and I would certainly appreciate more comments (pro or con) but I understand that many people do not comment when they read someone’s blog. I hope that I can continue receiving the higher traffic to improve my rankings in the blog ecosystem.

Last night I was able to also be a good neighbor in my own neighborhood as well. My neighbors across the street, Joe and Olga, are nice couple who have helped my husband and I more times than I can count with the little things like giving someone a ride etc. Olga had a brain injury about 15 years ago from a head-on car accident in which she almost died. She doesn’t walk very well and is embarrassed to go out in public because she gets confused easily and is afraid people will make fun of her. I try and talk to her every once in awhile but often it’s a one-way conversation with her doing most of the talking and me just listening and encouraging.

I noticed last evening a fire truck was parked across the street in front of their house and I knew that her husband had gone bowling for the evening. Norm and I went across the street and saw the paramedics attending to her in the carport. It turned out that she had fallen and bumped her head and was bleeding so she called 911. They wanted her to go to the ER to make sure everything was OK because she acted confused. I assured them that was her normal state of behavior because of her brain injury.

We could not track down her husband because he didn’t take a cell phone with him so I told her I would go to the ER with her. Norm took me to the hospital and I waited with her until they checked her out. Norm would’ve stayed with us but he had a meeting so I told him to go ahead because I would be okay and the meeting was across the street from the hospital.

It turned out my neighbor was OK with just a scrape on her scalp and a goose egg bump where she hit her head against the brick wall. Apparently she had gone into the backyard and lost her balance and fell backwards against the wall but was able to get up again. She was very glad that I went with her because she knew she couldn’t answer a lot of questions they would ask about her insurance etc. at the hospital. Olga is really sweet but it is very tiring to spend a lot of time with her because she asks you the same questions over and over again. I realized that it was important for me to be there both as her advocate and as her friend. Her husband didn’t get home until 11 p.m. so she stayed with my husband and I until he returned. We were at the ER for almost 3 hours which really isn’t too bad when you consider most of the time it’s a six-hour wait.

I told Olga over and over again not to be embarrassed about what happened but to realize that I’m just a nosy neighbor who is watching out for her whenever possible. She thanks me for being a nosy neighbor. I thank God that she wasn’t seriously hurt and I thank God that I was able to be a good neighbor. Even when you can’t walk and you need someone to help you do the daily things in life you can still be a good neighbor and be there for someone often by just listening and offering comfort and reassurance that everything will be okay. If we all acted as good neighbors I bet the world would be a better place. It’s true even if it does sound like a Coca-Cola commercial. 🙂