I watched him care for his wife until she passed away. He was very quiet, not prone to conversation, but always had a shy smile and comfortable way about him. I didn’t see him much after she died, except when he would head out of his driveway on his 10-speed bike for one of his long Sunday morning rides.
Several years passed and I watched as my neighbor painted his porch, washed his truck and cut the oleander in his yard. It was a solitary life compared to mine, which was filled with the demands and joys of my growing family, work and friends.
Then one day I looked out the window and saw him laughing as he hoisted a young boy on his shoulders. Even from a distance, I could see the light in his eyes.
Slowly, the transformation occurred. There were potted geraniums on the porch and wind chimes on a tree outside the kitchen window, where three people sat down to dinner now instead of one. Happy voices volleyed back and forth across the yard, evidence of a family in the making.
Rachel met Ed at his western store, when she came in to buy a pair of genuine cowgirl boots. She was visiting from New York and, not prone to shyness herself, asked him if he would show her around Tucson. Reluctantly, he agreed.
Who would have imagined that less than a year later, Rachel would pack her bags and leave her New York life, job and friends to create a new home with her six-year-old son Jason in the Sonoran desert? And who would have thought that my lonely neighbor would blossom into a family man, in just a few short months?
I am not a voyeur, but I have to admit that I have loved watching what has happened at the house across the street. Because I have seen something quite special: the remarkable transformation of a man, a woman and a young boy who have come together as a family through the restorative powers of love.
Love, as folk singer Joan Baez so aptly put it, is just a four-letter word. But within those four letters are a myriad of feelings, attachments, devotions and passions. There is no end to the types of love that exist. Parental love, erotic love, platonic love, “brotherly” love and spiritual love all may vary in their objects of desire, yet each one has a unique ability and potential to transform and educate, to enlighten and inform those who are lucky enough to experience it.
Although some would suggest that Judaism is a religion that is defined and dominated by laws and rituals, that is not an accurate depiction. Judaism puts love at the top of its agenda when it comes to how we relate to each other, how we relate to G-d and how G-d relates to us. Love is an essential element of Jewish faith and life.
The great Talmudic scholar Rabbi Akiva taught the greatest principle of the Torah is: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” Why? Because in order to love your neighbor as yourself, you must first know who you are and how you want to be loved.
Since love is best expressed through our deeds and actions, we are commanded first to know how we want to be treated, so that we can act in the same loving way toward others as we want them to act toward us.
We are taught throughout the Bible that love is transformative. In Genesis, Isaac transforms from a grief stricken boy into a healthy man when he brings Rebecca into the tent of his mother Sarah, and takes her as his wife.
The Shema, the central Jewish prayer which formalizes the belief in one G-d, commands us to love G-d with all our heart, soul and might.
It is because of this love that we follow G-d’s commandments, which will enable us to become a holy people and a light unto the world.
We are changed because of love. Over history, over time, over the years it takes to learn how to become loving and beloved.
I have watched Rachel, Ed and Jason grow into their love as they have grown into a family. From my vantage point, it is a picture that inspires and gives me a sense that love is much more than a four-letter word.
Copyright © 2015 by the Intermountain Jewish News
