The Missing Neighbor

So there is an older man, maybe late 50's, that lives across the street from me who is, for lack of a better term, a hermit. I've lived across from him for seven years and I don't know what his name is, have never had a civil conversation with him (he came over and yelled at me about five years ago), and know almost nothing about him. What I do know is that he has on the same clothes every time I see him, he doesn't have a job, family or friends, and the first time I ever saw anyone knock on his door was last week - and they were process servers!

I began to worry when the process server poked around his whole house and there was not a peep. I realized I haven't seen the old man in weeks and that I hadn't seen smoke drift from his furnace in at least as long. Both of his cars were in the driveway, the sun shield in one of them had fallen down, something he would normally fix immediately. My friend Crystal and I were standing at the end of my driveway talking about the 'what-ifs' of a dead guy on my street. We finally decided that it was neighborly to call the police and have them do a welfare check on the older gentleman. An officer showed up and poked all around the house but no one answered the door and she didn't see anyone move inside. She also didn't smell anything (gross, I know) so she said she couldn't do anything.

The officer noticed that there was trash in his trashcan, but I do remember that he didn't put out his trash for pickup last week. I'll be watching this week - trash pick up is on Tuesday.

I bet it sounds like I'm nosey. I'm outside a lot at night, talking on the phone and smoking (I don't smoke in my house) so I notice a lot. I pace, walk up and down the street, and rarely sit still on my porch so I'm in a position to notice things that other people wouldn't. I know that the people right across the street from me don't call their kids in until dark, the guy that lives two houses over from them comes home late every night and then walks his dog. I also notice when people have no schedules, like the family in the cul-de-sac that don't seem to have jobs? Just a guess. I know a few of my neighbor's, the woman who lives right next door is a good friend of mine, and I say 'Hi' to the lady on the other side.

I bet the rest of the neighbors hate me. I don't care.