Stan in Oly, WA
Well-known Member
Late yesterday evening as my wife and I were sitting in our living room talking, we heard voices from in front of our house. It turned out to be two females and a male who are in their early twenties, and who rent the house across the street from us. They were sitting on top of our 36" fence which is on top of our 37" retaining wall, so 6' 1" above the sidewalk. These are nice enough young people and we've had a congenial relationship with them---but as neighbors, not as friends. I suppressed my urge to rush out and tell them to get off my property. I wanted a few minutes to decide the best way to handle the situation. Confronted with something like this, I'm often able to figure out the least unfriendly approach that doesn't mince words. The last thing I want to do is to act as if I'm mainly concerned about their well-being, or some other issue which is beside the point. But I don't want to overreact, either. They were out of line, but they weren't vandalizing, for instance.
We were still trying to decide what to do when, deus ex machine, a heavy rain squall hit and they had to run for shelter. If something like this happens again, I'll probably just go tell them they're not welcome on my property. I could say that people on my property make the dogs keep barking, and it's very annoying. That's true, but it feels like it evades the issue. For practical reasons, I don't particularly want to be on the outs with people who have no real stake in the neighborhood, but I'm not keen on accepting insulting behavior, either.
Stan
We were still trying to decide what to do when, deus ex machine, a heavy rain squall hit and they had to run for shelter. If something like this happens again, I'll probably just go tell them they're not welcome on my property. I could say that people on my property make the dogs keep barking, and it's very annoying. That's true, but it feels like it evades the issue. For practical reasons, I don't particularly want to be on the outs with people who have no real stake in the neighborhood, but I'm not keen on accepting insulting behavior, either.
Stan