Good-bye, old friend

I grew up in a great neighborhood. It was your typical suburban subdivision: built around 1960; all the houses a variant of the same model; made for two parents, two kids, one car, and a swingset. Most of the original owners were about the same age, so the kids were, too. We went out in the morning with the rest of the kids, played in different yards during the day, and our moms never knew where we were until we came in when the street lights went on. We were all close. Our moms all stayed home, and our dads all went to work. If my friend didn't like what his mom was making for lunch, he'd call me to see what we were having, and then come join us, not needing an invitation. No one locked their doors or cars. The moms had coffee by the pool, and the kids had crabapple fights in the woods. In a silly sense, it was like Leave it to Beaver Land.

I was the youngest kid in the bunch, and I loved it. I'll tell you more about all of the LabNeighbors another time, but for this post, I just want to tell you about Kathryn Maltese.

Kathryn was a force to be reckoned with. When I accidentally put my fingernail in my best friend Buddy Maltese's eye while playing basketball, Kathryn ripped a hole in me I'll never forget. She did the same when I told Buddy about Santa Claus (I HAD to tell him that he'd been duped. He was my best friend, after all.). By the same token, when she was happy, the world around her was happy, too, because her spirit was so infectious. She was incredibly moral and ethical, but also definite, freely expounding upon why her beliefs were right. The outstanding detail about Kathryn, though, is how religious she was. Her belief in Jesus and Catholicism colored her very being, and it made her one heck of a person. I loved Kathryn. I looked up to her, I admired her, and I often thought that I wanted my spiritual feelings to be strong like Kathryn's. I knew that Kathryn really loved me, too, because when I stayed at the Maltese's house when my parents were out of town visiting relatives, I overheard Kathryn saying to my mother before she left, "Don't worry. If anything happens to you, I'll have her baptized before the week is out." Talk about love - she honestly cared about my soul that much! I was truly flattered.

Kathryn Maltese passed away last week. She was 83. I got to have coffee with Kathryn about two weeks before she passed, and it was a great visit. Buddy's brother Chip was there, and the three of us had fun reminiscing about the LabNeighborhood, and how lucky we all were to have been a part of something that special. You don't find that same kind of thing these days. The thing I'm happiest about is that instead of saying something nice at a funeral, I was able to say all of the things I wanted to say right to Kathryn's face. I wanted her to know how much I cared about her and really appreciated her. She was glad I'd taken the opportunity to do that, and Chip was happy, too. He understood that after-the-fact is, in a way, kind of pathetic.

One of my very favorite quotes ever is this:

"I shall pass this way but once. If, therefore, there is any kindness I can show or any good deed I can do, then let me do it now, for I will not pass this way again." I try to keep it in mind all the time, but Kathryn lived it. I will miss her a lot.