{"id":1732,"date":"2026-05-20T14:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-05-20T14:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dianaludwick.com\/?p=1732"},"modified":"2026-05-24T13:10:31","modified_gmt":"2026-05-24T13:10:31","slug":"neighbor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dianaludwick.com\/?p=1732","title":{"rendered":"Neighbor"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
This week we say goodbye 
to TV's favorite late night host.
And as part of his send-off,
here on screen is my neighbor.

Jose Andres walks on stage.
He embraces Stephen Colbert.
He is Love embodied, he is Energy.
He accepts a miniscule check
from the outgoing television host,
for a massive amount of money
earmarked for World Central Kitchen,
perhaps Earth's best charity.

And all the while, 
I am pointing at the screen,
and I am babbling:
\"That's our neighbor!\"
\"That's our neighbor!\"
\"Bethesda, Rep-re-ZENT<\/em>!\"

And my husband is nodding, 
slowly, calmly, charitably<\/em>,
knowing that I cannot be 
diminished in this moment.

\"That's my favorite human on the planet!\" 
I declare, pointing at the 
cheeriest chef-slash-CEO of Caring.
My husband absorbs this, does not argue.

\"NEIGH-BORRRRRRR<\/em>!\" <\/strong>
I sit back down, 
although propped at 
the edge of the couch,
leaning forward.

\"He's my favorite!\" 
I repeat, 
pointing at my parasocial Uncle.
My husband nods, silently.

\"I mean, for someone I've 
only seen<\/em> and not talked to, 
at the Bethesda Farmers' Market,\" 
I clarify, unconvincingly.

\"Don't you remember? 
\"We went to his restaurant for our third date! 
\"He IS<\/em> part of our family<\/em>!\" 
I assert, without evidence.

\"Okay, yep, I understand.\"
He returns his focus to the screen.
\"THAT IS OUR NEIGHBOR.\" 
\"Omigosh.\" 
I moon up at his bright pixels.

My husband, incidentally?
He is fond of saying aloud
\"I am the luckiest<\/em>!\"
While side-eyeing me.

We all have our heroes. 
Some of us get to live with them, like my husband.
Some of us just share municipal water supplies, 
like I do with my Neighbor.
Either\/or, what a life we get to live.<\/pre>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
\u201cNeighbor,\u201d a note on claiming parasocial connections, written Wednesday May 20, poem 140 in a series of 365 poems written by Diana Ludwick in 2026. Photo, “Neighbor!!!!!” a photo of CBS The Late Show with Steven Colbert, by Diana Ludwick (c) 2026. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1764,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,2],"tags":[1199,1205,1196,1202,1200,1197,1203,651,1204,1191,865,1206,1201,1195,1150,361,1193,1194,1198,1207,1156,1192],"class_list":["post-1732","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-2026-poetry-challenge","category-poems","tag-bethesda","tag-charity","tag-check","tag-evidence","tag-farmers-market","tag-goodbye","tag-hero","tag-husband","tag-i-am-the-luckiest","tag-jose-andres","tag-may","tag-parasocial","tag-pixels","tag-rep-re-zent","tag-restaurant","tag-spring","tag-stephen-colbert","tag-the-late-show","tag-third-date","tag-uncle","tag-wednesday","tag-world-central-kitchen"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dianaludwick.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1732","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dianaludwick.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dianaludwick.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dianaludwick.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dianaludwick.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1732"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/dianaludwick.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1732\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1770,"href":"https:\/\/dianaludwick.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1732\/revisions\/1770"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dianaludwick.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1764"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dianaludwick.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1732"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dianaludwick.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1732"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dianaludwick.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1732"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}