Neighbor Question

[jamies]

Unless you live somewhere upscale like the CO rockies I think these days there is a greater chance of low lifes than in a more surburban area.

[Morrigan20]

Take my advice: you're much better off having nothing to do with the neighbors, at least in a rural area. The drunk/drug dealer and his trash family up the road have bothered me for 4 years now. It started because I felt sorry for their little boy and allowed him to come over and hang out a couple of times, but then daddy started hanging around too - Daddy's on disability, you see, and doesn't have to work - complaining about his knocked-up wife and how he was supposed to quit drinking and smoking but it was just too hard. After he tried to hide his truck from the repo man in my driveway, I forbid any of them to set foot on my property again. Daddy kept sending his son down anyway. Daddy also tried to get a neighbor child to say I had molested him. The last time the son came over I yelled at him that he was not to come back ever again. Just today, his huge angry foulmouthed mama drove up next to me as I was trimming the road frontage and screamed at me to never threaten her child again. The kid had told her I'd threatened to shoot him. I told her to keep her kid off my property. She called me a (sphincter) and (female dog) and screamed that she was gonna do whatever she wanted. As she drove off she screamed "You're gonna be hearing from me!"

Call the sheriff, you say? It is to laugh. It took him 45 minutes, he couldn't even find the house, he kept rolling his eyes and looking away, and saying that since HE didn't see or hear her threats, there was nothing he could do.

So now I'm a sitting duck, living alone, scared to walk past a window...all because I acted friendly toward TRASH.

[ognend]

This is my experience also. We have a next door neighbour who claims he is a survivalist type, self-sufficient etc. In the 3 years we have lived here, we renovated our home, built fences, cleared the property, put in new driveway, installed stuff like solar, built and grew gardens, kept bees etc. etc. He had done absolutely nothing but ask for stuff, down to buckets of road base to repair his driveway potholes after a rain. Of course, not even a thank you for that. We have given him produce (we grew) since he has not grown even a single plant (you think being self-sufficient would include that), invited them over for a supper or two (where we provided everything to eat and drink) etc. They invited us back once and told us to bring our own drinks. In the whole 3 years, we have given them boatloads of different things with next to nothing in return. One day my wife told me to stop giving them stuff and I did. He tried to invite himself over a few times but I said "OK I will call you" and I never did. Finally got the message.

We have another set of neighbors who have been extremely generous and friendly, in fact, they were too friendly - started showing up unannounced at our place. I personally do not like the unannounced business but they did not want anything except for friendship so you cannot fault them for that.

Our neighbor on the other fence - she is so paranoid to not look like she has taken more than she has given - it is almost a fault. Very nice person.

Finally, we have a neighbor who has clearly indicated she wants nothing to do with us (except for the polite exchanges of "hello" and "good morning" or something) and we are happy to reciprocate.

However, this is not a VERY rural area, more like a small village of several thousand and we are on its periphery. It is also Texas, most people show pride of ownership and are very concerned about what is being said about them and how they look in front of others - this precludes them from being leeches and users.

[bigpaul]

I live on the edge of a small rural market town, parish population of 2,000. I don't have anything to do with the neighbours, apart from a polite "good morning" if I meet them while i'm walking the dog, I don't socialise, got nothing in common with them, they don't know my business and I don't know theirs and I don't want to, everyone is friendly enough I just prefer my own company to that of others.

[branDcalf]

I don't have much to do with my neighbors. We're all pretty busy.

But that being said, if any one of them has an accident, a death in the family, illness, etc. and any of us find out, we will jump in and do whatever it takes to get them through a rough time.

[AK-Cathy]

I just have to put a postscript on this thread. We have a "handy" guy that works for us on occasion that has started to work for one of our more elderly neighbors that lives about a mile away clearing brush, cutting dead trees etc. Apparently my next door "pill" neighbor tried to have the elderly neighbor declared incompetent and to have herself appointed as manager of her property and affairs. OMG. I've had no use for that pill from day one practically but now I actively loathe her. What kind of place did we move to???