Marleen Brooks found a note waiting for her when she got to her home in Park Hills, Mo., one evening last year. She had never heard of Wanda Mills, but her heart broke when she read the handwritten plea.
“Would you consider to become my friend,” said the note from Mills. “I’m 90 years old — live alone and all my friends have passed away. I am so lonesome and scared. Please — I pray for some one.”
Brooks is a 37-year-old property manager and she had no idea this woman even existed, but the address was for a house across the street from her and just a couple of doors down. She didn’t know anyone even lived there.
The next day, Brooks and a friend took cupcakes and went to visit Mills. (See the photo below.) The friends spent about an hour with the older woman. They found out Mills had lived in the house for 51 years. Her husband was dead. Most of her remaining family was either dead or lived far away.
Living in the middle of a busy neighborhood, Mills was invisible — and lonely.
We’re neither friends nor enemies, just strangers who share the past
Society needs storytellers to help make sense of a changing world
Economic Man needs no heart, because love and God are dead
‘This path leads to somewhere I think I can finally say, I’m home’
When love finally dies, it’s like a fever breaks and the pain is gone
Narrow focus causes one to see a specific tree and miss the sunset
We live in Reverse World, where black is white and good is evil