Recently I had the best place to live, was there for at least 6 months and then I got the text that would change it all, Guess who is moving in below you Meeeeeeeeeeee!!!! It will be so great I just jumped at the opportunity, and with you upstairs what could be better?
Well I could think of a lot that could be better with this situation. I must say after touring some of the other apts, in my building on the upper west side of the burbs, mine had the most charm and at home charisma than the other apts in the building. I haven’ t been able to see what the out building behind us looks like but they are newer and don’t have the Victorian charm that this one does. So now my cool factor just hit like a 5, in my rating system for this fact that I liked where I lived and said hi to the neighbors but it wasn’t like they felt the need to knock on my door for tea or milk or something.
I had experienced that before, we moved in to a second floor new apt, when I was with the boyfriend who shall remain nameless. This was to avoid the slum lord that we had as a previous landlord. ( when mouse sh*t ends up on your dinner plate in the cabinet! Time to move) This was brand new mouse free zone, perfect. Well they thought since it was their house they would come up to say hello, or invite us down for drinks. Before I knew it communal living was taking place where their kids were popping in to see if we wanted to play t-ball or have a bbq. Ugh~ what had I done, there was no privacy!
Then we had the condo situation where that seemed to be great your own place, no work everything is done. With strings attached, if you put out too many decoration Letter from the board. Too many people over not parked properly Letter from board with violation. Didn’t move your car in time to plow Snow Fine from the board. It was kind of like a nursing home since everyone there was older, and the younger people had children. We lived in the nosey section, our neighbors actually walked up to the back slider as we were redoing the condo. ( I have proof of footprints in the snow and confirmation from one neighbor) Then when spring came I didn’t even have the first shovel full of dirt before they were asking me what I was planting if I was doing a more involved landscape, container gardening? What the hell is a container garden I work for a living and don’t have time for this. So this was one of the final things that made me miserable which was a downward spiral and lead to me being unhappy and the end of the BF relationship.
Then I found my solstice, the Penthouse, quaint, cute, homey and I didn’t know the neighbors. It was even better after meeting them I found out I knew 2 of them from my Ex-boyfriend, we said hello, there were no facebook requests or tweets. Then they move and BAM her we go. I got a few emails about if anyone had DSL or internet well, can we say I am not having you steal free internet, no all systems are locked in the house. Who even asks that question wouldn’t you just take your computer and see first? So she was all budget concerned, ok I am conscious about that too but I wouldn’t budget any utility until I have lived there a year and seen if there is a need. She is a constant facebook updater also, this scared me a little since I don’t want to end up on her page.
She moves in and I was scare since I didn’t want to get roped in to helping with that either. I didn’t see her that much and she still would update so I can honestly say I knew exactly what was going on. She had told me of her failed marriage, and new guy she could never meet anyone good. Well seems a change is address is a change in karma, seeing she now has a boy toy shall we say that seems to visit quite often. Which is great and fine, but some of us don’t take every Wed,Thurs off to have a party at the house where you are loud until 11:30. I don’t even want to consider what goes on below me, but some of us sleep and go to the gym at 5:30 am.
Here in lies the dilemma the other night I am obviously home and she sends me a message on facebook, that says sorry I missed your b-day, don’t know how I live below you. Great, that ended up on the Wall, grrrrr I like to use facebook as the social network not as the I just ate lunch at Spago type of thing. Which leaves me with this, is it better to be a neighbor that lives secretly and just says a casual hi, or to befriend your neighbor and gush about happenings?
