Won't you be my neighbor?

He turned his mower off as I stepped out of the car, a sign he had more to communicate than an across-the-lawn wave.

“My father-in-law will be arriving tomorrow,” he began. “He left home this morning, but he’s got the cat, so he’ll stop halfway.”

We knew the new owners of the house beside us had purchased it to accommodate guests, and as a place for her dad to spend the summer. They told us he’d stay about four months before heading back to Florida. It’s cooler here, for one thing, and it gets him past most of the Atlantic hurricane season. Of course, there’s also the family time.

It all sounds quite normal, and that’s encouraging. We want to assume he’ll be a satisfactory neighbor. His daughter and her husband are pleasant enough. But, our magnanimity is a little dubious.

We’ve lived next door to some real doozies.

During our early years in the farm cottage, the closest house was occupied by a mid-40s bachelor who made a point of offering advice on marriage and parenting, neither of which he’d ever experienced. He also liked to comment on how many loads of laundry I’d hung out on any given day. All that was exactly as weird as it sounds but pales in comparison to the revolving door of characters who lived on the second floor of the house we rented after we moved to town.

There was the raging couple over whom the police broke down the front door, while the landlord stood nearby, futilely waving a key in the air.

There was the fellow whose creativity manifested as crop circles mowed into the lawn, a guy who spent days painting Rust-Oleum and hot rod flames onto the sides of a beat up, open trailer he purchased when he and his girlfriend were gearing up to leave for Oregon. The axel blew apart in Ohio, and she broke up with him soon after. Smart move.

There were the gamers, who never left the building. Like, ever.

Best was the “family” of seven, all curiously similar in age, who ran up our shared electric bill by leaving the windows open in the heat of summer, when the air conditioner was already working overtime. After repeated, unsuccessful attempts to talk them into a more cost-conscious habit, I handed the problem over to a higher power. 

And it came to pass, in the process of time, that when the windows they were flung open, verily the circuit breaker to the second-floor air handler did, mysteriously, find itself in the off position. Miraculously, power was restored as soon as the windows were shut. Did I mention that the electrical panel was in our first-floor apartment?

Amen.

Photo by Zac Gudakov on Unsplash

Our tricky-neighbor karma persisted even after we bought our own home, a few blocks away from the duplex. I could regale you with accounts of untended garbage, fight-dog training, strident guitar solos, tree carnage (though not as bad as this guy, thank goodness), and fall-down drinking.

But, I’d rather pour myself into the memory of a next-door neighbor we’ll call Claire, who moved in with her elderly father. This was five or six rounds of residents ago. Honestly, I’ve lost track of the numbers, but I am happy to report that the shenanigans have all but disappeared now that it’s no longer a rental.

I don’t want to give you the wrong impression about the condition of the neighborhoods around here. We live in a destination location with a high incidence of investment properties. Rentals are common, and tenants come from every walk of life. In addition to the wing-nuts, we’ve lived next to lots of less eccentric folks over the years. But, their adventures are a little more Leave it to Beaver, and I’m in a Buffy the Vampire Slayer mood.

Photo by Artem Podrez

So, back to Claire and her veteran, cancer-fighting, aphasia-compromised, wheelchair-using father.

My other half took to them right away. He’s nice like that, appreciating the old man’s past, and wanting to help them get situated, especially under the circumstances. So, he acted neighborly by hanging shelving, loaning tools, fixing stuff.

I, on the other hand, was less receptive.  She was friendly, with an inviting smile. But, the first time we shared more than a cursory greeting, she leaned across the railing of her deck and told me all about her broken marriage, her hateful ex, the brother her parents preferred over her, her employment sagas, her financial challenges, her dreams, her traumas - one chronicle after the next, like trips to the loo after a round of Uncle Bert’s undercooked burgers.

At a minimum, I decided she needed a short course on boundaries, but there was something else I couldn’t quite pin down. My spidey-sense was electrified. I tried to remain cordial, but I kept her at arm’s length.

Early one evening, she showed up in the front yard with a sheet pan full of nachos, fresh out of the oven, and pretty much invited herself inside, where she thundered through personal revelation after personal revelation, chatted, lingered, laughed, laughed louder, and drank most of the 1.5 liter magnum of pink zinfandel she’d brought with the appetizers.

Photo by Nadi Lindsay

I started giving my husband the side-eye about ninety minutes in, but he didn’t pick up what I was putting down, so the party went on. Two hours, three hours, four (her poor dad!). I took to overt yawning, turning off lights, remarking on the time. I wished we’d set up a secret signal for evicting unwanted guests, like yelling, “Fire in the hole!” from a back bedroom.

When she finally left at 11 o’clock, the dam broke. I blamed my spouse for having too much fun, for not suggesting she leave sooner, for letting her inside in the first place, for not reading my mind. He accused me of being inhospitable and intolerant, of expecting too much of people, of stifling his generosity. We had quite the row, one of our worst ever, and came to no real resolution.

At this point, I need you to think of all the tall tales ever told to you by a toddler, grow them up into adult anecdotes, throw in an extra helping of drama, and imagine them spilling forth from your neighbor’s mouth at every interaction. Cars that won’t run. Checks that don’t clear. Hair appointments, and lunch dates, and nights out that just have to happen, even when there’s no money. Fathers who fall and break their femurs. Rental cars that crash into trees on the way to the hospital. I couldn’t make this stuff up, but Claire was a pro.

One day, a team of uniformed officers turned up at her door. They were there for hours. Not long after, we learned she’d been charged with, among other things, falsifying records for her father’s pension, burglarizing multiple nearby houses, and lifting credit cards while out at local establishments.

When the news hit, my partner instantly understood the magnitude of the moment and took immediate action.

He leaned in and, with a sheepish grin said, “You were right.”

I’ve never felt so vindicated in all my life.

The man from Florida arrived just ahead of a boisterous, summer thunderstorm. We haven’t yet had the pleasure of meeting him, or his cat, but he looks nice enough, from a distance.

~Elizabeth

Photo by Adeolu Eletu on Unsplash