We have neighbors. Some are close by, and we hang with them. Others we can’t even see, and it takes over five minutes to walk to their house. Recently the sign to the left appeared across from our house. Many of the pictures that are on this site came from walks that I took on the other side of that sign. I am not exactly sure what I did (ok, maybe I do), but it has landed me in the “bad list” with our far-away neighbor. I will call him The Old Man. I think that if I had just been intimidated like he wanted, I would still be on the “ignore list”. Unfortunately, I asked him why he was being a bad neighbor, and I guess you don’t ask a bad neighbor that kind of thing. The land that is now off limits is an island that has been turned into a peninsula, and an upscale subdivision. There are deed restrictions, and it was sold as a future gated community. The Old Man is making sure that the gates are indeed put up. In order to build there your house must be huge, your garage must fit 3 cars, etc. etc. The houses that are out there sold for over 500K in an area where 250K is high. There are only 2 houses, but they are lake front properties. Unfortunately the lake front is full of stumps from the way the lake was made a hundred years ago. This little city is a blue collar hunting and manufacturing town, so there is not much in the way of upscale development. Real estate in general is doing badly, especially here in Michigan. So the end result is that we have neighbors who bought a nice house in a lousy place, and there is little they can do to change that, except control every little detail they can. Oh, and he can.
As frustrating as it is to be living near someone who treats the neighborhood as filth, I can’t help but pity him. He’s stuck, probably in debt, and since he can’t change where he lives, he will just do everything in his power to make sure we know he is better than us, and that he thinks he has something we wish we had. He would not believe the truth.
It probably does not help that this is what he sees when he pulls out of his private-no-trespassing-no-parking-tow-away-at-owners-expense drive every day:
I guess I am not that motivated to find another place to keep the boat.
*chuckle*
The boat does seem to have a nice home…..
Sad that he can be so miserable in such a nice place…
It’s funny that he acts like such an old man, yet really is not so old after all. It was kind of sad to watch you talk to him a few weeks ago. He seemed so busy being mad he didn’t realize how much he seemed like a parody rather than a person.
Also, I find it interesting that he yelled about the parking, but the no parking sign doesn’t start for quite some way forward from where the true ‘no parking’ area begins. Maybe he should bypass these signs and go with whatever they come up with for the This Place is Not a Place of Honor signs. That might have a better deterrent effect.
I had a thought… We are to overcome evil with good, to bless our enemies and do good to those who treat us badly. I thought it might be nice to put together a CD of the beautiful pictures you have taken over on his spit of land and its surroundings, and put it in his mail box as a gift for him to enjoy.
I have been trying to think of such things for a while, but one of the problems is that he does not like that I have taken pictures. He refers to my visits as “taking pictures in my front yard”, when I clearly avoided anything that might be considered his yard or even pointed my lens in that direction. His vendetta is against the neighborhood, and he makes it very clear that we cannot even converse with him until we are in the same “class” as him, meaning that we have the same values, desire the same things, etc.
The post touches only lightly on the spirit of the encounters. The details are far uglier. I have been nothing but civil and accommodating, but he still acts as if I would desecrate his property in a second, given a chance. That is very last thing I am interested in doing, but he does not seem to understand, or be interested.
I really am not sure what blessing I might be able to give, apart from giving him what he seems to want, which is for us to leave. I think the best I can do is leave him alone and be friendly. I will continue to ponder the question… I may just give pictures to his wife, who seems sweet. Their dog is nice too, and the kids love him.
They have complemented us on our kids, and have always been friendly to them. The kids helped The Old Man move a huge snapping turtle out of the road during the summer. It is hard to know how to explain to the kids that they can’t explore/play back there anymore and why. It may be that I am the only one in our family that is unwelcome, but I have a hard time letting my kids go play somewhere that I am not allowed to go simply as a safety issue.
Hmmm, yeah, that is tricky… Well, I am sure you will think of something. Maybe giving pictures to the wife would be a good one… and a plate of cookies at Chistmas… it is hard to imagine someone so bitter. I am sure you have all been very nice an civil. I will put a sticky note on my computer and pray for the “old man.”