When I was a high-school student (and dinosaurs still roamed the earth), I remember studying Robert Frost’s poem
The Mending Wall, which taught us that “good fences make good neighbors”.
This past Thursday night, I also learned that when a clown of a neighbor threatens to call the police, said clown becomes even more agitated when you beat him to the punch. Allow me to explain.
Three neighborhood kids (including my youngest son) and a sleepover guest were outside playing
Ghost in the Graveyard. At some point during the game, one or more of the participants decided to make a slight adjustment to the rules. Under new game play, instead of hiding or seeking, they upped the ante and urinated on a neighbor’s bushes and lawn. The neighbor, who (a) wasn’t invited to play, and (b) as mentioned previously, is a clown (or, if you prefer, an idiot), decided he didn’t like kids peeing all over his property.
On the surface, I agree with this gentleman-slash-douchebag. I would prefer my lawn to be just that—a lawn—rather than a toilet. Having said this, if a young kid or two peed on my bushes, and I caught them in the act, I might do something drastic like—oh, I don’t know—open my door, and say something pithy like, “Hey kids. Stop peeing on my bushes.” If they persisted, I might even be inclined to pick up the phone and say to the kids’ parents, “Forget to pay your water bill? Need a plumber?” As for my own kid, I would make him water all the plants and flowerbeds for weeks to come, since he'd shown a related interest. In the scheme of things, though, I wouldn't act like the sky was falling.
Not Mr. Douchebag. To him, this was the greatest offense man has ever perpetrated against his fellow man. Before long, I received a knock on the door. Another neighbor’s kid said to me, “Hey, someone wants to speak to you.” Immediately, I started wondering if I owed anyone money or if, in a drunken stupor some other night, I had placed my first-ever order for an eight-ball. Not so. I walked down the driveway to investigate.
“Yeah, hi. My name is Nutly McMoron
[not his real name]. I just caught your son and a couple of his LITTLE FRIENDS
[condescending fuck] with their dicks out, pissing ALL OVER my bushes. I should call the police for damage to my property.” I wondered what he imagined was in the kids’ urine…sulfuric acid? Weed-B-Gone? I thought of a good answer.
“Oh.”
“And if you don’t deal with them right away, I’m calling the police.”
“Oh. Well, if my son did that, I will certainly deal with him.” (Most likely by saying, "Don't do that, dum-dum.")
“Okay. I appreciate that. Cause they had their dicks out.” Yeah, I caught that. I thought about telling him that most human males who pee, unless they’re freaks, find this to be the preferred approach. I didn't, but was glad he reminded me they had the technique down.
What I didn’t realize was that Mr. McMoron planned to linger in the neighborhood for several hours until he could claim his pound of flesh. My wife Patty and I wandered over to our friends’ house to strategize. En route, the idiot yelled out, “Don’t take their word for it. They’ll lie.” Wow, a kid might lie to stay out of trouble? Unheard of!
After talking to the kids, who denied involvement in the desecration of the precious bush, we started home. The idiot was waiting outside. We ignored him and went inside. Twenty minutes later, I walked outside to hear the neighbor still ranting to another neighbor about the travesty of which he was victim. Again, he was ranting on and on about calling the police.
So, being the good neighbors we are, we saved him some trouble. We called the cops. When they arrived, one officer spoke to the man, who raved and gestured and cast aspersions not only on the local children, but also on the community at large, the police and me.
As a gesture, I suggested to “my” officer that if it would make my idiot neighbor feel better, he could come to my house and urinate on any bushes of his choice; after all, his dog pees on them daily. I even proposed that he could pee on my leg, if it would make him go inside and shut his cakehole. The officer disagreed with my suggestion, but while my neighbor flipped his lid, I quietly talked the officer into attending my book launch in a couple of weeks.
Ultimately, the cops put a little fear of god into the lads, we instructed the kids to never go near this man’s property again, and things settled back into some semblance of normalcy.
I’m thinking about building a fence—nothing major, just something modest and about twelve feet tall, with a crocodile-infested moat around it. Good NEIGHBORS make good neighbors; a good fence keeps the idiots out.
