A Good Life

“And now here is my secret, a very simple secret: It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye.”
― Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, The Little Prince

Time and again we are told stories of people who strive to live an extraordinary life. Stories that stir up our imagination and build up our hopes to have a "better life". A life that when we are old and waiting for our end, we can look back and say that yes I have led a good life. Yet what qualifies as a good life?  For the longest time I  been fascinated by people who go on adventures - people who are complex and live an "enriched life", till I met our neighour Joe.  Joe and Sonya moved into our neighbourhood 4 years ago. and knowing him has changed my attitude about how I want to grow old and how I want my story to end.  Now to just give you a backstory, Joe and Sonya moved  next door around 4 years ago.  There are some people who leave a mark on you, they teach you to live life. Joe is one of those people.

I have been meaning to write about him for a while now. Joe moved here in his early youth from Portugal, and like many of the new immigrants moving to Canada, didn't know a single word of English. To give you the gist, he till date barely knows how to read and write, and his English even after years in Canada, is so heavily accented that at times you take a guess at what he is saying. What sets him apart from the other people I have known, is that he is love personified. He loves his plants - gardening all the way into his mid eighties, and every time you meet him , a bit of his optimisitic attitude rubs off on you. Small things like remembering my birthday,along with all the members of my family,  staying up till late so that he wouldn't miss out on giving me my card and flowers, taking care of our garden as if it were his own and of course his hugs and joyful" Hey Avy," whenever he sees me.He is the type of guy who waits with cans of pop for the guys who come to pick up garbage, the guy who will bring his homemade wine when he sees that we have guests over, the guy who changed my mind about what legacy I wanted to leave behind.  His kids and grandkids come to visit frequently - they still have Halloween and Christmas parties at home and believe me he parties more than we do. And he still takes homemade lunch for his kids every Wednesday at work.

Recently he had a health scare, yet when we went to meet him, he was cheerful like always. By all means Joe has led an ordinary life - nothing exciting, no adventures, no travels, but what he and his wife have now, is what I want. I want to be surrounded by people to love and in return hopefully be loved. Joe has taught me to appreciate smaller things in life, to make the ordinary life extraoridnary by just adding a dose of love and kindness.  That in my opinion is a "good life " amd if I can emulate even 10% of his attitude and personality, I would consider my life to be successful.