. . . on familiar faces
YOU KNOW THEM and you don’t know them. The people that you meet when you’re walking down the street. Part of the furniture of the neighbourhood, as familiar as any of your local landmarks. The lady with the tartan trolley who never meets your gaze. The impeccably dressed older man who leaves his house at 9am, like clockwork, for the paper.
The cheeky schoolboy teetering under the weight of the bag strapped on his back. You see them and you don’t see them. You know them but you don’t. It was like that with Christy.
It seemed as though every time I stepped out of the house he was there. Walking to the bookies. Or coming from the bookies. Walking up and down the avenue with that familiar I’ll-get-there-eventually gait, ambling along in his cap and jacket, giving off his gentle brand of peace with, and love of, the world.
The choreography of our encounters hardly ever changed. Before I even had a chance to register his presence his arm would be up in the air, a hand raised in greeting.
I’d return the wave and sometimes his hand would go up again, a sort of insurance wave, as though somehow the first one might not have registered with me, as though the worst possible thing that could happen that morning would be that I might think I’d been ignored. No harm in an extra wave, just in case. A wave cost nothing to Christy.
It became a kind of game. For me anyway. Just once, I wanted to be the person that lifted a hand in greeting first. Our game was a kind of cowboy quick-draw, only without guns. But I was always too slow; either that or cool-hand Christy was too quick and I never got there before he did.
He walked around these streets raring to connect with people. Until you got used to it, his prescience was slightly discomfiting. I’d barely be outside my door and there he’d be, hand in the air as though it was his mission in life to meet and greet. I knew it wasn’t just me because I saw him wave at everyone else; even people who didn’t wave back. I’d encourage my daughters to wave at him and they did, obediently, and then eventually I didn’t need to tell them. It was just what you did.
Another brilliant neighbour, Barry from across the road, called in the other day. He said, “You know Christy, who walks up and down the avenue?” and I said, “Yes, what about him?” and he said simply, “He died.”
And it’s strange how hearing about the death of someone you don’t know, someone you have never spoken to, can make you cry but after I closed the door the tears came. Christy. Gone. When I just always expected him to be there and now he wasn’t anymore and he would never be again.
The thing that is really upsetting me, I think, is that more than once I said to myself, one of these days, when Christy waves, I am going to stop him. I am going to take the time to walk up and find out more about him.
I’m going to ask where he lives. How long he has lived there. Just the basic details of his back story. Getting to know him beyond the waves.
Maybe after a few more chats, it would get deeper. You see, I had a few questions. What’s the secret Christy? How come you always seem so happy and at one with everything? Why is it so important to you not to shuffle along with your face to the ground but to always make that connection with other people – strangers or friends? To keep your head high and your eyes open and your hand in the air? What’s your story, Christy?
You get to know a bit of a person’s story at a funeral. On his coffin there was the recorder he played and a copy of The Irish Times because he was well-known in the family for being a whizz at the crossword.
His brother said he was well read, with a passion for words. Nobody could beat him at chess. He had no children but he had a clatter of nieces and nephews who had their own children. And he never missed their birthdays. “Gentle” was the word that kept cropping up.
I thought there would be loads more days, weeks, months, years even, to talk to Christy. I have a feeling that our first conversation would have led to many more conversations. We would have graduated from the wave to proper neighbourly relations. We might possibly have been friends.
What an eejit I was for waiting. What a dope. What’s the point of all those self-help books cluttering the shelves if I still don’t seem to have grasped the fact that there is no such thing as later or tomorrow? There is only ever now.
So long Christy. I knew you and I didn’t know you. One thing’s for sure, I’ll miss you. I already do.
In other news ...
There’s still plenty of time to galvanise your neighbours in support of An Taisce’s National Spring Clean, which takes place in the month of April. Organise a clean-up of a local litter spot to take place any time next month, then register the event online. To receive a free clean-up kit, call 01-4002220 or see nationalspringclean.org