MY NEIGHBOR'S DIVORCE

CATEGORY: Every day survival

Mostly houses are secret places. We surround them with well tended lawns and tiny fences and color coordinated flowers, but inside life grows wild.

Last night, I was walking my dogs. We took our usual route, looping past rows of secret houses, contained gardens and uncontainable lives. Jade and Starski explored with their noses; I inhaled the night and thought about my unfinished novel, my usual preoccupations.

Outside one such house, a familiar, but largely unknown neighbor, climbed out of his jeep. I have long admired his orderly yard, his blond children, the scent of family barbecues and the laughter that sometimes wafted through the air when I passed. While my dogs sniffed his petunias, I offered my usual perfunctory greeting, adding a meaningless "How are you tonight?"

The only trouble was that he really wanted to answer the question. How am I? he repeated, walking toward me, one hand raking his thick hair. Not good. Not good at all. The house would be on the market soon, and he didn't know where he was going.

By then, my dogs were tugging at their leashes. An extended stop, a genuine conversation was not in the program. "I'm sorry to hear that," I said.

Last week was my twenty first anniversary, and my wife surprised me with a divorce.

Again, I murmured my regrets. I would miss them in the neighborhood, I said, though my words must have seemed as empty as his future looked at that moment. I had never really known them.

He took a step backward, reestablishing the distance between us. If you know anyone who's looking to buy a house...

"Not off hand, but I'll think about it."

From the window, a girl of about ten peered out at us, but when she caught me looking, the shade snapped shut.

I continued my walk, but I was no longer thinking about the number of words I'd written in my novel. I was thinking of the secret life, the private longings and unknown sorrows that exist behind the walls of every house I passed.