The lights are on twenty-four hours a day, the curtains pulled wide. Until the house was overtaken by rats, a peculiar man inhabited this space. The house belongs to his parents. His mother died several years ago, and by all accounts from his neighbors, the peculiar man delivered a heartfelt eulogy. Since he never talked to anyone in the neighborhood it took his mother's death to put him behind a lectern, to speak to those of us who have seen him for almost fifty years but have never heard so much as a "hello." His father, a proud former Senior Olympic participant, now in his late nineties, lives in a nearby nursing home, and by all accounts won't be able to return. By all accounts the three were the only Republicans in Kensington.
For many of those fifty years the peculiar man's next door neighbor put his garbage can on the street each Monday night. Dismayed that in the morning the can was upended, the garbage strewn across the sidewalk, he was determined to find the animal that singled out his can, foraging for leftovers. The neighbor waited very early one morning and discovered that the peculiar man, then a peculiar boy, ran out of his house, down the stairs, and upended the can. The neighbor collared the peculiar boy and dragged him back home, up the stairs, and warned him not to do this again. This was more than forty years ago. The peculiar boy, now a man, has never spoken again to the neighbor. If they find themselves walking down the street the peculiar man will cross to the other side just to avoid the neighbor.
When the peculiar man's mother was in a nursing home his father wanted to spend the day at her side. I volunteered to walk their housebound airedale (Peggy Sue) in the middle of the day so the father wouldn't have to worry. He left me a key, and I climbed the stairs, unlocked the front door and opened it, only to find that the peculiar man, who, until that moment I didn't realize even existed, was sitting on a sofa in his underpants. Startled, he ran out of the room. Plastic garbage bag in hand, I put the leash on Peggy Sue and headed down the street.
I haven't seen the peculiar man in several days. Neighbors have said that he's sleeping on a sofa somewhere. We keep waiting for Clark's pest control or a truck from Orkin to park before the house. Meanwhile, the curtains stay open, the lights remain on, twenty-four hours a day.