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A bad storm came through our area last Friday. At one point my husband and I heard a loud bang. We immediately ran to our front door, afraid of what we were going to see. A large tree branch fell against our house but luckily, it fell in a good way (see photos below). We were nervous the rest of the night but thankfully no other branches fell. My husband had to work on Saturday so he was going to clear the debris on Sunday. I had trouble sleeping Friday night so I slept late on Saturday. When I got up I went outside to take another look in the daylight. To my surprise everything had been cleared away! A neighbor was walking to his house and I asked him if he knew anything. He said another neighbor thought we weren't home so he went ahead and cleared away the debris. We still haven't had a chance to talk to this neighbor about it. I realize this neighbor was trying to be helpful but it just struck me odd. Honestly, it seems intrusive. It's my house and I don't want my neighbor coming onto my property without my permission to do any kind of work associated with it. I wonder what could happen in a scenario like this if the neighbor got hurt. Would we have been responsible? Or perhaps we wouldn't be responsible because he didn't get our permission first. It just seems to me that things could've gotten ugly had an injury resulted.
This neighbor moved in last year and we're neither on friendly or unfriendly terms with him. We've barely had any contact other than a few waves from our driveways. So, anyway, I'd like to know what other people think of this - was it helpful or intrusive? Would you be appreciative or annoyed?
Here are the photos. My husband was able to twist/bend the metal back into place on the gutter so the only remaining damage is to the handrail post. I don't have a good photo of that but the only thing that happened is that the post came apart where the branch landed on it. So that will be a relatively easy fix. We were so lucky that nothing fell into a window or onto the roof. I think the loud bang we heard was from the large part of the branch hitting the pavement walkway because only smaller branches and leaves landed against our house.
Location: Finally the house is done and we are in Port St. Lucie!
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I would have been grateful that the neighbor was being nice. I would even make some cookies or something as a thank you to take to them. Who knows, you might just acquire a new friend.
Is the tree on his property? He might have figured it was his responsibility if it was. If it wasn't his tree, maybe he had some tree limbs down on his lot and he already had the chainsaw out and was taking a load to the brush site and figured he'd save you some time and trouble by just grabbing that branch for you.
I'd feel like I owed someone a favor if they did that for me. I don't like to owe anyone anything. If that's why it bothers you, I can understand your discomfort. Why not get him a bottle of wine or liquor (in my neighborhood liquor would be more appreciated than wine) as a thank you? Or a gift card to a restaurant if you don't like to give alcohol as a gift. My thinking would be that it would take my husband at least an hour to chop up a tree limb that size and find a place to get rid of it.
I would have been grateful that the neighbor was being nice. I would even make some cookies or something as a thank you to take to them. Who knows, you might just acquire a new friend.
Try not to over think this.
^^^^ THIS....good neighbors are hard to come by sometimes....
Okay, maybe I should be appreciative instead of annoyed, lol! I'm a native New Yorker; I was born and raised in Queens and lived in New York for more than four decades. This sort of thing wouldn't happen in New York! So since I'm currently living in NC, I'll have to adjust my way of thinking. I'll be sure my husband has a friendly chat with our neighbor, although I don't necessarily feel like we owe him a gift.
Gosh, that's typically how people act in the South - you know, all friendly and helpful and such. My neighbors would do the exact same thing, and as an old lady living alone, I would be extremely grateful and offer them a cake or some home-made cookies or such. It's just what we do around here. Don't worry, you'll soon grow to appreciate friendly, helpful neighbors - hopefully.
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