That's Mrs. Mills to You!

Sylvia and Reggie Mills* were an older couple who lived in the next building over from me. I met the couple when I was an enumerating for elections in the 1980s. I did not have a good first impression of them. When Sylvia opened the door, the "smell of old people" – tobacco and urine – hit me immediately. I asked the necessary questions and left as fast as I could.

I didn't really think about them after that. Then the summer came, and I used to see Sylvia sitting outside with another lady who lived in her building. I never really saw the husband, though. Eventually, we nodded to each other as I passed by, and then in time we started to talk. I am not quite sure how I became friends with these two ladies, though I think it was Rona, the other neighbor, who spoke to me first. As time went by, I ended up spending most of my time in the Mills' stinky home.

Reggie and Sylvia grew on me; they were a nice couple, and Rona was a laugh a minute. Reggie was extremely quiet; he hardly spoke. If we were in the living room, he sat in the kitchen alone. Rona and I were lucky if he even greeted us coming in. We were not offended. We knew he was a very shy man – except for when he was drinking, that is, for then he would come out and talk to us. He let down his guard when he was drinking and actually laughed a little.

Rona and Sylvia loved to laugh, and it was good for me, because they made me laugh too. One time, I dropped by and Rona had a serious look on her face. She said to me, "Carol, I came in tonight and Reggie got aggressive."

"No way!" I said, "Not Reggie! What did he do?"

Sylvia and I broke out in laughter after she gave her answer: "He said hello!"

That was Reggie – he never talked unless he was drinking. But we loved him.

Sylvia was a comedian in her own right. She was the opposite of Reggie; she never stopped talking. She had so many stories to tell. She would always talk about her past, raising her nine kids. She tried to make even the sad stories sound funny. Even when she was not trying to be comical it came out that way.

She told me about the time she went to see her doctor. Sylvia was a woman brought up in an earlier generation, and everyone referred to her as Mrs. Mills.

The doctor greeted her: "Well Sylvia, how are you feeling today?" She answered: "Not bad Richard, and you?" To which the indignant doctor responded: "You cannot call me Richard, my name is Doctor Sterns* to you." Sylvia retorted, "And you cannot call me Sylvia, my name is Mrs. Mills to you."

The lady had spunk. I admired her so much.

Now, Sylvia was not the most energetic of people, and she was not the healthiest either. She smoked like a chimney. Reggie was always concerned about her health. Long before she became ill and went to the emergency room thinking she was about to die, he did all the housework. But after she was diagnosed with emphysema, he no longer complained. That hospital trip did give her a scare and she did stop smoking, but she never resumed doing any housework. She sat down all day and watched soap operas.

One time she told me about the dream she had had the night before. In her dream, she was washing dishes, and the more she washed, the more dishes there were. She just couldn't seem to get to the bottom of the pile.

"But you don't understand, Carol. I washed so many dishes, I was tired all day."

"It was a dream!"

"I know, but I am so tired from washing those dishes, I am going to bed early tonight."

Sylvia was a character.

We were all shocked when Reggie was the one who was rushed to the hospital and died within a few hours. Everyone thought for sure that it would be Sylvia who would pass on first.

The children had barely gotten through the funeral when they moved Sylvia out of that stinky house. They wanted her to live in a clean apartment much closer to them so they could keep an eye on her. For years they had wanted their parents to move, but the stubborn couple would not budge. It took the death of their father to get their mother to comply – as if she was really in a position to do otherwise.

I got the chance to visit Sylvia but once in her new apartment. I was not prepared for the shell of the woman that greeted me. She was completely lost; a broken woman. It broke my heart to see her that way. She knew who Rona and I were when we visited, and she would talk intelligently, and then two or three times she asked, "When is Reggie coming home?"

"Ma, you know Daddy is dead now," one of her grown-up kids would answer.

Before we had a chance to make a second visit, we heard that Sylvia had passed away. It was just three weeks after her husband's death. I cannot say that I was surprised. I had learned from my psychology courses that sometimes both elderly spouses die within a short period of time; although, I never thought I would witness it for myself.

*not their real names

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