Rude people (or: the detriments to living in a neighborhood)

I have a neighbor who is friendly, but we are not friends.  We just don't have much in common...other than she is my age and has a son Andrew's age and a daughter Lily's age.

She watches Shadow for me when we go away for a night or two.  I don't ask her to do it much...I think she's done it three times in the 3 years she's lived here.  She is fabulous to Shadow...walking her multiple times a day and giving her lots of attention.  I am very grateful to her for that.  It is hard to find people to watch your pets, much less treat them with kindness and attention.

We went camping over Labor Day weekend, one of those experiences over the last 3 months that should have been a great blogging post...if I had been blogging.  Anyhoo, I asked my neighbor to feed and let Shadow out, since we were only going to be gone about 36 hours.  We came back from the trip, I thanked my neighbor, end of story.

Until a few weeks ago, when I was standing at the bus stop.  I don't go to the morning bus stop much...I usually just send Lily and Andrew by themselves.  But Lily had requested that I walk down with her, so there I was.  And this neighbor was there as well (she doesn't usually do the afternoon bus stop...so we usually don't see each other).  We were going through the standard "neighbor with similar aged children" small talk...how does your child like school, what is the teacher like, can you believe the homework, etc etc.  I mentioned that I was frustrated once again by Andrew's lack of organizational skills.  I mentioned that although I am not the most organized at home, at school I had always been meticulous.

She jumps in eagerly, "Oh, I know.  Your house is just a mess.  I almost couldn't stand it when I went in to take care of Shadow.  My husband convinced me to not straighten up, because he thought there may be some reason for all the mess.  ha ha ha."

I was a bit taken a back at her boldness, and cringing at the realization of my worst nightmare...that people are truly bothered by my house.  But I laughed it off, telling her that I had actually cleaned up before leaving the house for camping, and that a little clutter just doesn't bother me.

She continued exclaiming about the state of my house, until I successfully steered the conversation elsewhere.


I stewed on this for a while.  I could have countered with a smart alack comment about how her children are often unsupervised, about how I discovered she had left my children unattended while they were playing at her house...and they were only 4 and 7 at the time.  How I wouldn't smoke in front of my children.  Etc. etc.  But I can't say that.  I'm her neighbor.  We're going to be co-existing for a long time.  You just don't go there...except that she had.


Fast forward about a week.  I'm walking out to afternoon pick-up.  She comes out of her house and shoves a paper in my hand...asking me to fill out a letter of recommendation for a job she's applying for.  When I express dismay at this as I have no idea about her nursing skills, she reassures me that it can be very generic and the lady told her to just give it to a few neighbors.  I begin filling it out and joke that giving it to a neighbor could be dangerous...what if a nosy neighbor commented on you not pulling your weeds or something.  She laughed and said, "Yah, it's good thing I'm not doing one for you, because I'd have to tell them about your house."

I told her enough was enough, and she went on a little bit to another neighbor that had walked up about how shocked she was at the state of my house.


Let me be clear.  I am not, by any stretch of the imagination, the worst housekeeper out there.  My house is not the most disgusting that you will go into.  I think it is well within the normal range of messiness.  I clean my kitchen daily, my bathrooms enough.  The clutter builds, but my house is not gross.  I joke about my lack of housekeeping skills.  It is certainly not my strong point.  But I'm not trying to get a job cleaning houses.  This is working for my family right now.

She got my gander up.  I wish I had said everything to her in that paragraph above.  I should have at least shoved that letter of recommendation back at her unfinished.  But I didn't.  I glared and finished a very generic letter.  I will not be asking her to watch my pets every again.  I certainly won't ever ask her into my house.  I will continue to be polite when I see her.

That is the detriment to have neighbors close by.  I can't cut them out of my life.  I must grit my teeth and bare it.  Grrrrr.