Laird Klingler is a member of Neighbor to Neighbor, an informal group of Cornish residents who volunteer their time helping elderly people in need with projects around the house. Here, in an edited interview, Klingler talks about his work for Helen Lovell.

I’m a widower now, but when I was married, my mother-in-law was an Italian immigrant. I would always ask, “What do you think of the flowers I planted?” and she’d say, “Can you eat them?”

Helen’s a bit like that. She’s very old school in the sense that a garden is there to produce. I always have to fight for space for the flowers. She let me put in some dahlias over there.

Things grow well here, so the weeds grow well, too. I try to get over once a week, and it takes about an hour and a half.

When I was weeding, I saw the lawn needed to be cut, so Steve and Cathy Parks who live down at the bottom of the road came up here and did it. Joe Rozzo came up and helped put the netting on for the blueberries.

That’s the way these things go. This is a volunteer group. You don’t tell people what to do, you just let them know what needs to be done. Everybody chips in a little bit here and there, and I think it works well.

We have contact people in town who let us know what needs to be done. There’s Jim Fitch, whose family has been here forever, and Connie Kousman, who is the head of the general assistance committee in the town, and Henry Homeyer, people know Henry from his garden articles (in the Valley News). Henry’s actually the one who came up with the idea for the group.

What happens is that they learn of people in need, let me know, and I maintain an e-mail list. I send out a message saying people need some help, and those who are able, respond.

We built a ramp for handicap access to a person’s home, that was a major project. We cut, split and stack firewood, and there’s a lot of yard maintenance. We meet once a month over at Stubb’s and Laura’s (cafe) for breakfast.

So much of what happens in the world is beyond our control. How many of us can really understand what’s happened with the banking thing? But with this, you can actually do something.

I believe that the centerpiece of the New Testament is the Good Samaritan story, and I take that to heart. It’s not enough just to think as a Christian in relation to helping those less fortunate; you have to commit to a physical act of helping.

I firmly believe that as you give, you receive. You feel better when you’ve made some sort of contribution to make things better. And I like working with the soil, too.