Christmas with Mr. James

The August sun, already hot despite the early morning hour, streamed across the front porch and into the southerly windows of my 1920's bungalow. Outside on the street in front of my house, a man climbing out of a white Cadillac with a boomerang-shaped radio antenna on the trunk caught my eye.

He was tall and broad, with a belly the perfect shape and size to be considered "Santa Claus quality". Having opened the trunk, he stood leaning over the car with a cigarette dangling from his lips, rifling away for something. From where I was standing I could see only his brown leather fedora moving behind the raised lid as his hands and arms swept back and forth inside.

Suddenly he stood up and fixed his gaze in my direction. One breathless moment of uncertainty passed before I realized that he couldn't possibly see me from the glare of the sun bouncing off the storm door. Hiding behind the reflection, I took frank appraisal of his circa-1970s street detective attire.

Brown, well-polished cowboy boots offset his white slacks and a navy blue button-down rayon shirt. The aging countenance of his graying black beard gave him the air of a man well-seasoned and street-smart, and the surety of his classic fedora and the disregard with which the cigarette hung from his mouth gave the impression that he "owned" more than just the street corner on which he was parked.

Having just moved to the area, I felt ill at ease in my new neighborhood. Stories of a rash of burglaries in the vicinity had me on edge, and rather than leaving me with a sense of security, the police precinct located up the street made me feel like I had moved into an area that warranted the constant passing of patrol cars.

I regarded everyone with suspicion.

After awhile the man left, only to return that afternoon in a different car, and thus began the pattern. Monday through Friday, he parks his car in front of my house and waits, surrounded by clouds of cigarette smoke and the notes of old-time blues wafting from the radio. He arrives every morning around seven-thirty, remains for an hour, and then disappears until the afternoon shift from two-thirty to three-thirty. Four months, three different cars, and the same fedora: without fail I see him every morning.

And every morning now, Mr. James waves as he searches the trunk for his tools: a hand-held stop sign and a safety vest that leaves his belly exposed. Not many kids pass in front of my house on their way to school, but those who do are accompanied across the street by a sure-footed man in his late sixties. Mr. James is retired from the railroad, but he still engineers the flow of traffic as he places himself between the oncoming cars and the elementary school kids rushing to cross the street. Twice a day this unsuspecting crossing guard smokes a pack of cigarettes, carpeting the ground with butts as he converses with the local color and waits for the youngsters in his charge.

Mr. James laughs at my initial suspicion of him and tells me not to worry. He says that if I were his daughter, he would tell me to be wary of anyone sitting in their car in front of my house. Mr. James always asks after me, and after not having seen me for a week he became concerned enough to knock on my door to see if everything was all right.

Mr. James is a generous man, but he says he's not looking forward to Christmas.

"My wife's already a big woman, and dag if she won't blow up like a blowerfish if I don't get her something nice, and then neither of us will make it through the end of the year. But my finances are just too low...I guess I can only do what I can, but I'm gonna have my daughter talk to her anyway and see if she can't talk some sense into her."

I don't know what Mr. James is going to do about his wife's Christmas present, but he doesn't have to worry about mine. Mr. James doesn't know it, but his neighborly presence made me realize there is little that can overshadow the gift of his kindness to those around him. Conversing with Mr. James has helped to quell the suspicious air with which I had regarded my surroundings, allowing me to gain a new appreciation of the various characters that make up the tapestry of my neighborhood.

I take comfort in the thought of Mr. James in his fedora, parked in front of my house everyday, making sure that the kids (and anyone else with whom he comes into contact) is doing "just fine". His presence has made me feel right at home, and for that I am forever grateful.

Merry Christmas, Mr. James. And thank you.