
These Are The People In Your Neighborhood
Howdy Deadsplinterdwellers! Tell us something about your neighbors. Unless you live in a chamber alone under the sea, or a monastery by yourself on the top of a mountain. But otherwise, you must have something to say.
For example, the people on my block are mostly nice, we’re friends with some of them. But….
There’s one family on the block with husband and wife child psychologists who are deeply weird. Hoarders and difficult people. And considering their profession, people with strange ideas about kids.
As just one example, it’s easy to walk around our neighborhood. So every single family, when they have a baby, will take the kid outside in a stroller or in a strap-on carrier or something. It’s good for the kid, helps get them to nap, gets the parents out of the house, etc. But not these people. They had babies, and then nobody saw any sign of them for years. Not even sitting out front or in the backyard.
The kids got older and would scream at the parents, the parents would yell at the kids, just weird all around.
And now the kids are gone. The school bus doesn’t stop there anymore, even though school is still in session. Their next door neighbor, who is pretty much the only one who talks to them, doesn’t suspect foul play. But what else happened? Did one of the parents move out and take the kids? It’s a mystery.

So what about you? Got any stories about neighbors, either present or in the past? New puppy owners with a baby Golden Retriever they’re showing off? Somebody who got in trouble with the homeowners association for letting their lawn go wild? Wild parties? Girl scouts selling cookies? Nosy Karens and Chads who keeping narcing on random passers by?
Maybe when you were growing up the next door neighbors were nudists? Or you used to have the guy who stood in the driveway for hours tinkering on his ’78 Trans Am while listening to Zeppelin? Or maybe you had a neighbor who everyone suspected was under surveillance based on cars with guys in the front seat always parked out front?
Share your stories here.
A couple of my friends have parents who are child psychologists. They both turned out fine, but it wasn’t for lack of trying on their fathers’ parts, who deployed various child-rearing theories on them. The stories…
And speaking of stories, of course I have many about my neighbors. There was a brief period when my floor was inhabited solely by gay people, except for one apartment. That apartment was bought by a couple who the whole building wanted to get to know better because one of them came from a fairly prominent and very wealthy family. One of my neighbors (she didn’t live on my floor) ran into the male half and asked, “So, how are you enjoying living on an all-gay floor?” Meaning the other apartments, not his. He said, without batting an eye, “Oh, I’m not gay. [His girlfriend/fiancée/whatever she was] is the bisexual one.”
And the thing is, my building is so boring. It’s gotten younger, lots of young families (how they can afford it I don’t know, especially the couple who bought my neighbor’s apartment) but it used to be so middle-aged and middle-class, and yet when I would describe it to people, who everyone was and what they did for a living, even I thought it sounded far more interesting and glamorous than it really was.
It’s funny how the golden years are always right around when you first move to a place. It always goes downhill or else too yuppie, but never better. And when you talk to neighbors who moved there before or after you, that’s what they think too, for some reason….
We “pioneers” all moved in together, when the building was first built and finally habitable. None of us knew the neighborhood very well, so it started out being a kind of “make your own fun” kind of place. Especially since we have that roof, and fairly spacious apartments that have great “flow” and are very good for entertaining. But one of my neighbors very perceptively said, “Moving to a new place is like going to college. You get there and you couldn’t be more excited. By year four you can’t wait to get out.” We’re on year 15, but I know exactly what he meant.
I have always got along fairly well with the neighbors everywhere I’ve lived. I haven’t necessarily liked them all but no big guess or anything. A few that I was friends with. My current next door neighbors on the one side are the loveliest youngish couple. We visit over the fence. On the sidewalk, and front yards. They occasionally bring over food, we return the favor. A few doors down on the other side is an elderly gentleman who keeps me supplied with firewood. It’s a good neighborhood but I hate my house. I’d love to move but I don’t want to break in new neighbors.
It’s easier to fix houses than neighbors.
That sounds like something from a Robert Frost poem. Or Benjamin Franklin’s Poor Richard’s Almanack.
I have okay neighbors. The one behind me was the worst. That asshole changed the grade on his such that most of the water comes down my lot. When fence post in the back rotted, I refused to do anything about it because it is his goddamned fault. My former housemate stupidly did an Al Haig and tried to usurp my homeowner authority by talking to him about it. I told former housemate to politely get fucked and yelled at him for taking something he had no legal authority to do.
The new backside neighbor I spoke with today about it. Ironically enough.
My parents are difficult neighbors. They have “things” with all of them.
The worst is their current neighbor who they fought over dog noise and trees on the fence line. My dad was put in the back of a police cruiser three fucking times. Twice he earned it by threatening to kill their noisy Pomeranian. It was my lawyer friend who put a truce to the war after they sued dad for “damages” after he trimmed the tree growing on their side but whose branches were over his as he is allowed by law. He is a good litigation lawyer and got them to eat their suit because he figured out the person who wrote it was a paralegal not lawyer. Oops.
Later they had to cut down the tree anyway because it was a danger.
I laugh about it now because it was a less violent replay of Operation Paul Bunyan incident where US went all out to cut down a tree after the NKs killed two US officers over a tree trimming.
ETA, this was where we realized my dad was starting to lose his marbles as he started saying things he normally wouldn’t. He hates noise and irritating noises the worst which is ironic as he had Doxies as the family dog.
The Pomeranian frequency is pretty infuriating, to be fair.
One minor detail I forgot to add.
Both times the neighbors let their dog sit outside barking incessantly for at least 4 hrs both times. When my dad went over to complain and he saw they were unconcerned about their dog’s barking that was when he lost it.
Still, all of us kids were “Geez dad!”
Unfortunately he is not the only male in my immediate family that spent time in the back of a cruiser. I did during the end of the Cokehead Narcissist era… At least I wasn’t booked.
Did you know, by the way, that a “doxy” is an old term for a prostitute? It might date from Shakespearean times, or maybe even earlier.
The more you know….
I really like our neighborhood and neighbors. It is a city street of 100 year old row homes, but buffered by a university, a boulevard, and a non-through street. Mostly owner occupied. There are amusing stories about the democratic gay women living in one half of a semi-detached home and the Trumpian pentecostal couple in the other half. And there was brouhaha when other neighbors rented their home to “3 lovely nursing students” which morphed into 4 girls, 4 live-in boyfriends, and loud drunken parties with peeing off balconies and beer cans everywhere. (City parking issues coupled with poor public transportation caused frustration due to the extra 8 cars.) The owners live on a different block of our street and were shamed into replacing the animal house aspirant renters. We have been here for 23 years, it is a good place to live.
If I ever formed a band I would name it “3 Lovely Nursing Students.”
It was the first time I heard the phrase “Sack up Bro”.
I used to have a creeper neighbor who would go steal copper wires off units between renters/owners. He eventually went to jail for selling drugs for a few years when I was a preteen and that was a great time. Anyways, in case you’re wondering, he also came outside in literally only his tighty whiteys with a can of beer to see my friends and I taking pictures before prom.
Boxers, maybe, but briefs, no way.
anyways….
when i first moved in here i had the bestest neighbours…elderly couple…anna and albert
they were sweethearts..always up for a little chinwag or an evening beer in the backyard
i miss them
on the other side i had angelo…who you know…wasnt a bad dude…just sorta kinda maybe a little bit gang affiliated…had some interesting visitors most days
for a few years anna and albert got replaced by an absolute dickhead and his wife who had the dreyfuss twitch…i actually forgot their names….but he stroked out so ha! good riddance…
and angelo went to jail
nowadays i have a lorenzo who is a quiet introverted hermit type on one side
and a daniel who believes in the power of music on the other side….by wich i mean he sings when hes awake…near constantly….sometimes in tune
anyways…they are both pretty decent neighbours
What’s he sing? Opera, Eurovision, or death metal?
classic rock and pop for the most part
My neighbors live so far away that I actually get a little excited whenever I see them.
Distance makes good neighbors too
I like my neighbors. We made it a point to introduce ourselves to everyone (cutoff was six houses on either side of the street) when we first moved in. We’re friendly with all of them and very good friends with two of them. One couple has kids the same age as ours. We often have playdates which turn into pizza nights. The other is a gay couple of which one is a chef and together they own a wine bar. The one who isn’t a chef is my Seattle BFF. We play video games, board games, and volleyball together. When my dog was alive we would walk our dogs together almost every morning.
There hasn’t been much turn over on our street. Two neighbors aged out of their homes. One left to be closer to family and another left because they felt unsafe…due to an unhoused person harassing them one time. They were a bit waspy.
There was a party house on our street. It was rented out to a bunch of college students. Luckily for us it’s six houses down and our street is a major artery and hosts a bus route so there’s constant traffic noise.
Anyway all this to say that I love my neighborhood and our community has been pretty solid for the past eight years.