I am a nervous talker. If there is an uncomfortable moment, a dramatic pause, a conversational lull, you can count on me to fill in the gap with chatter. Once I was given a massage gift card by a relative. During the massage, I was so uncomfortable being touched by a stranger that I talked through the whole experience. 60 minutes of my incessant talking. It was awkward, not relaxing. For me, silence is a hostile stranger, not a friend. So these words slap me on the hand: "Saying nothing sometimes says the most." -Emily Dickinson "A fool is known by his speech and a wise man by his silence." -Pythagoras "The right word may be effective, but no word was ever as effective as a rightly-timed pause." - Mark Twain If I want to love my neighbor by listening to them, I have to let silence do its work.

In early 2020, two months before I ever heard the word "coronavirus," I stopped at a convenience store near my house in LaGrange, Georgia, to fill up my gas tank. When I went inside to grab a few items, I noticed the clerk had a thick Indian accent. "What part of India are you from?" I asked. The man seemed surprised that I knew his ethnicity. He asked: "You know India?"

What do you associate with summer? Here in Florida, we get to do certain summer activities year round, like go to the beach or barbecue. I do go to the beach year round, but I only go in the water in the summer! I hate cold water. One of my favorite things about the summer: the fruit. When the watermelons go deep, deep on sale, my heart skips a beat. It is my favorite fruit by far. When I was pregnant with my third child, I cut up an entire watermelon, propped the bowl up on my swollen belly, and ate the entire thing while I watched So You Think You Can Dance. Ah, summer memories… This year New Covenant has a new way to launch into summer. It involves looking up and looking out.

Did you grow up on Sesame Street like I did? Then perhaps you too know the song: Oh, who are the people in your neighborhood? In your neighborhood? In your neighborhood? Say, who are the people in your neighborhood? The people that you meet each day It’s an outdated song because we don’t meet the people in our neighborhood each day. At least I don’t. I live in Winter Springs Village. It has green spaces, a community pool and mailbox area, and front porches on every house. My family has the smaller sized home—a bungalow—and our houses sits on a zero lot line. That means I can almost reach out and touch my neighbor’s house. And I still don’t know my neighbors. We live in an age of looking down at our phones, electric garage door openers, and minding our own business. Gone is the neighborhood economy (“May I borrow X?”) and the front porch leisure while kids play on the sidewalk. With the pandemic, talking to strangers is more than odd—it’s hazardous. Is this a problem? Not for some, but it is for me. Because God tells me to love my neighbor.

“And Who is my neighbor?” WHY DOES HE DO IT? Two days a week, our trash goes out to the side of the road. On one of those days the recyclable containers are added. Once the cans are out, they are forgotten, even if the big noisy collection truck is heard. Later in the day, the emptied cans appear near our garage. Who brings them up? It has to be one of our neighbors.