There was an old wrinkled soldier from many wars back. His leg was forever broken and his left ear and eye were dead but he was very good at cooking so he always had parties with his children and made them all the food of the world that he had picked up during his travels. One day he sat in his living room and looked out the window and there were two Russians moving into the house next door. He closed his blinds and never looked out that window again. A week later he noticed a new house was being built across the way, he stood out on his front lawn and asked the contractor who it was for; a couple of Germans fresh from New York and fresh from the boat before that he was told. He shook his head and went back inside, never wanting to sit on his front porch and stare at the beautiful view ever again. A big Japanese family moved in down the street later on, after that he made up his mind to go to a different grocery that was up the street instead of down where they were. He didn’t like taking his morning walk down the block anymore either. He imagined their voices and it made him cringe. He heard them laughing and it reminded him of rainy days. He saw their kids running on his sidewalk and he remembered the bomb in that town that went off and killed almost everyone. So he stayed in his house and closed the windows and turned up his radio. He still heard kids laughing.

   “Damn kids! Get away!” He yelled at them. They ran off back home, but would return the next day running and screaming like kids do. He had his son wave them off one night, but when he returned from scolding them his face was red with embarrassment and he was quiet the rest of the night. The old solider told a story that night about when he was almost shot by a hidden gunmen in a bakery but instead a father with his kid took the hit. Everyone nodded, it was an awful story.

   “Damn Germans,” he mumbled to himself. Days and weeks and months went by and the old solider stayed in. He figured it was winter from the snow being trampled in on the floor, he learned it was spring from the fresh flowers people brought him, he saw that it was summer by the parade he watched go by from his window. Then one night he got angry that he had missed it all, he realized he had missed everything. He cursed his neighbors and spit at the thought of the children and glared at their house through the closed window. He didn’t step outside though, he never thought about stepping outside.