All my life my parents have taught me to help others. Helping others is one of the things they have found to be most important to teach me growing up. While some may see helping as a chore, I see it as an opportunity to make someone’s life just a bit easier.

She had been our neighbor for about 9 years, we knew she was pretty old yet but we didn’t see it coming. When she passed it was as if the world had just frozen and nothing else was important. She didn’t live with any one besides her dog, Sammy, but when we went to the funeral I was surprised to see how many people showed up. During holidays, birthdays, and other occasions it was always the same people that came, her four children, a couple of friends, and us. Did those people even care or did the show up just to be polite? I couldn’t help but think how those people must have felt that day knowing that they missed their opportunities to see and spend time with one of the most kind and humble woman that anyone could have met. She spent her whole life thinking and caring for others.

One Chrismas that we spent with her I remember she told a story about a young man she had helped after one of the wars. She told me that when the war had ended there was a young man who lived across the street from her and while battle he had injured his leg. He was young and couldn’t afford his surgery so every day she would go to his house to cook and clean for him while his mother went to work. She told us that the young man eventually died before he could get his surgery, but it gave her some comfort knowing that she did everything that she could in order to help the former soldier in his last few weeks. She had many stories about how she helped people.

Even when she got old her old she still never stopped helping people. For the years that my family knew her she worked at St. Jude’s medical hospital in the children’s ward. Every time she saw us she always had a story to tell about one of the kids she worked with. You should always help others even if you have to go out of your way. This is something that both her and my parents have taught me throughout the years.

There are many things I will remember about her but I think the stuff I will remember the most is all the life lessons she taught me. Over the years she became more than a neighbor she became family.