The Girl Next Door

It is the moniker we assign those bubbly, lighthearted women who possess all the purity and loveliness of someone who doesn't need to try too hard to be liked by everyone. "The girl next door" is simple and unassuming. We covet her naivety. We cannot imagine that underneath such a carefree persona could be anything but a life experience as flawless as her peaches-and-cream complexion. Whether out of envy or a need to preserve some untouched beauty in the world, we allow few frailties to beset the girl next door.

But what do we know about the real girl next door? The woman standing next to us in line, sitting beside us at church or on the subway--what do we know about her? The friend of a friend, with great hair and manicured hands, the girl that never looks like she's trying too hard--do we assume she is everything she pretends to be? Do we assign to her, in our imaginations, a carefree life with no great upsets, no deep regrets, no unrealized dreams? A beautiful woman, so put together, could not possibly understand the pain of another. The girl next door, with her picture-perfect life could never know the hollow pit of loss, could she?

She is a myth, the girl next door, dreamed up by Hollywood to inspire us to see more Doris Day movies. To believe that she existed...that perfect woman. Or, better yet, that we could be her. In the real world, the girl next door is a woman like you or me. She has a complex story of her own. And however charmed her life may appear from the outside, she has experienced disappointments and challenges, some so deep, they are untraceable to the human eye.

How well do you know the girl next door? The child, the teenager, the executive, the mother, the grandmother -- she is a girl at heart. She is a girl like you. Until you've walked a mile in her shoes, you cannot possibly begin to know what really makes her tick. So reach out to her. Let her be brutally honest, and be slow to judge. Show her understanding and compassion. That is how you will get to know the real girl next door. And how she will get to know the girl next door to her--you.