Who would you help?

So last Sunday in the wee AM hours, the neighbor of a friend of mine's house burned up. Technically it is still standing so it did not burn "down", but pretty much toast. Burned toast inedible for human consumption or habitation.

The neighbor is the neighborhood curmudgeon who sticks to himself, although my friend does chat with him. Waved greetings, neighborhood watch chat and making sure he gets his trash out on trash day. You know, she knows him, like anyone knows their neighbors anymore.

So now three days later, the poor guy is sifting through the soot damaged belongings that once defined his world. And she is helping him.

The only one helping him.

Cool, right? Brought tears to this curmudgeon's soul.

But it got me thinking. If my neighborhood had a similar event, who would I help?

The neighbors across the street or to the west, absolutely. The ones on the top of the hill, no question. Anyone else? Might call 911, but still pretty unlikely. OK, the Mormon's, yeah they are pretty pathetic... I would probably take food to them as the kids work on their clean up. But the drug dealer across the street... she and her damn pit bull are on their own. The one's next to her, maybe a plate of cookies and some dog biscuits for the pooch, she does wave nicely when we both happen to pull into the driveways at the same time. The jerk next to us, you know the one who we call the police on at least once a quarter due to late night parties or crazy roomies fighting. Yeah, he's lucky we are too law abiding not to have set said fire.

But the bigger question, who would help us?