Neighbors

This post by Crazy Aunt Purl regarding her quiet family and loud neighbors got me to thinking about my neighbors and how I grew up. Check out the comments for people's responses.

Growing up, my mom was not much of a yeller, but she was a lecturer. She would talk for hours and hours and hours about how I needed to do this or that. It got to the point where I could just tune in and out and respond with an "uh-huh" now and then. (Y'all know that feeling: Woops, must look like I'm paying attention, insert appropriate head shaking and "um hmm, I understand" here.)

On the other hand, my father, who I lived with for a few years, was a yeller, and an occasional spanker. Let me tell you, if I got in trouble, boy, I knew I was in trouble. But, once it was done, it was over. That was it, end of story, "now what do you want for dinner?" type thing.

Of the two, I'm not really sure which one I preferred, since they both sucked.

Sometimes, I fear of turning into 'those loud neighbors', particularly since I have had all out screaming matches. I used to wonder how people could be so loud when they had neighbors right next door. I mean, aren't people concerned with others being all up in their bizness? Well, let me tell you, I sure as hell wasn't concerned about the neighbors when I was in the middle of a fight. Thankfully, though, I'm not much of a repeat offender, so I don't warrant being known as one of 'those loud neighbors'.

My neighbors are not yellers, but they still annoy me. Every single darn one of them are smokers and it's disgusting. I generally don't mind if people want to slowly poison themselves with those cancer sticks. Really, I don't. But I mind when my breathing air is polluted. Our ventilation system is bad, so their smoke comes into our house. It seeps in through the A/C vents. Even more so than that, what I really mind, is the butts that they throw everywhere, especially in the little green area near my entrance (What do you call that area?). Tell me, what does it take to throw the butts away, people? I'm tempted to get all passive aggressive and dump all the butts on their doorsteps. That wouldn't be good for community relations, though...

Sunshine