Kindness and Neighbors

"To love our neighbor as ourselves is such a truth for regulating human society, that by that alone one might determine all the cases in social morality."

~ John Locke

On a recent morning, I had a nice conversation with an older gentleman.  In his 80s, he has been living in Florida for more than 20 years.  But he spent the earlier parts of his life in other states.  He shared a story about a neighbor he had many years ago in Indiana.  The gentleman I know had to fill holes in his property with gravel, and he had a number of bags of gravel in his yard for this purpose.  Early one Saturday, he heard a knock on his door and it was his neighbor asking where they should put the gravel.  The gentleman and his neighbor got the job done much faster than if he had done it alone.  As we talked about what a good neighbor he had had, we agreed that it was a pretty basic thing to do.  "Basic and unbelievable," the gentleman said.  I asked him if he still kept in touch with his neighbor even though they lived in different states.  "Of course," he said, "When you meet a person like that, you don't let him go."