I’m wearing my winter robe and there’s something extremely comforting in that. The outdoor temps cooled down to 50℉ overnight, so the indoor temp is sitting between heat and A/C where neither is running and I’ve opened the backdoor for the dogs at least 10 times in the brief amount of time I’ve been awake. Que Cello music.

The children next door add entertainment to my life. I’ve written about the one I call Alador here, even though that’s not his real name, it’s just what I call him. Stephanie, the middle child will boldly walk over and bang on my front door to ask a question whenever the mood strikes and they are always valid questions.

“Do you have any paintbrushes?”, was one, “Do you have any glue?” was another. Her biggest ask one time was for stuff to make smores. She wanted to surprise her family and she had the chocolate, but nothing else. Surprisingly, I had everything else needed and loaded her up with supplies. It’s funny but she never seems disappointed if I don’t have what she asks for, as if her main mission is to knock and trust me, this child won’t stop knocking until I appear, so it’s fruitless to ignore the knock.

The dogs go wild with their barking over the knocking on the door and this is one time in my life that I’m grateful there’s no doorbell, but we have a system in place. While the dogs are busy barking at the front, door, I slip out the backdoor and through the gate to the front yard to greet Stephanie and await my question of the day.

But yesterday, there was no question and she came bearing a gift. She hopped down from the front porch and made her way down the path to where I was standing outside the gate. She was holding a bag of coffee beans and as she handed me the bag, she said, “My Dad wanted me to give you this and to wish you a Happy Easter.”

It was the sweetest gesture as her small hands placed the bag of beans in my larger, weathered looking hands. It took me a moment to find the words, ‘Thank you’, and I asked her to tell her Father thank you as well. Then she retreated home.

I didn’t have the heart to tell her that I rarely drink coffee anymore thanks to Dr. Jason and I had to wonder if the coffee was really from her Dad, or was it just Stephanie’s way of letting me know that every knock isn’t an ask. This knock was a gift and really as I think about it, while living solo regardless of the ask, every knock is a gift.

Feature Photo by Maria Kovalets on Unsplash