Ignorance Is Bliss

~ Bitchy After 60

I have to admit that I have been rude, and in this case rude with purpose. Sometimes it just has to happen. I didn’t say anything rude. As a matter of fact I did the exact opposite. I said nothing.

Last year this time I shared a blog entitled This Should Never Have Happened, where I was quite upset about my chauvinistic, racist, ex-cop neighbour. The man entered my front yard, while he knew I was in my back yard, interrogated and took the license plate number of a couple of black ladies who pulled into my driveway by mistake. I was upset for two reasons. One, I was home and he should have just told me that there was someone in my driveway, and two, he treated these women like criminals instead of neighbours.

I was still stewing about this a few weeks later when his wife drifted over to ask some mundane question that I can’t even remember. Earlier in the spring, I had mentioned to both her and her husband that my husband was in the early stages of Alzheimer’s. I thought they should know in case they felt he wasn’t himself. The wife asked her mundane question and then blurted this out immediately afterwards, “We have friends who would really like to move to Nova Scotia and who we would enjoy living next to so let us know when you are selling your house.”

I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. I guarantee you that I have never once mentioned selling our house. This woman automatically assumed that we would need to sell because of my husband’s Alzheimer’s. She automatically assumed that I couldn’t handle the house on my own were my husband end up in a care facility in the future. I have no idea where she got that idea from since she has watched me garden, shovel, drag things around and do a ton of household chores by myself for four years. All I could think to say in my shocked state was that it would be at least 10 years and that other people were interested. 

I know I can be a pretty bitchy person at times, but I could never do that. How insensitive and opportunistic does one have to be to do something like that?

Well, I will say that I now had two major things to stew about, along with all the other little things that have irritated me over the course of the four years since these people became our neighbours. I will admit that I thought about a whole lot of not very nice things to say and do to these people just to vent all my anger and make myself feel better. Of course none of these things would have helped the situation. Instead, upon deciding that I really, really didn’t like this couple, and I couldn’t even pretend to like them enough to make small talk, I would just ignore them. 

Boy am I good at ignoring people. I have successfully made it into a fine art. It started with having to bite my tongue to stop any automatic responses whenever the ex-cop yelled across the property. It took many tries before I could do it without feeling guilty, but I did it. Then I made sure that when they were on or close to the property line I would go somewhere else in my yard. They began to clue in, to the point where while raking and bagging leaves last fall, the wife made of point of standing on the property line for over twenty minutes, while I efficiently mulched my leaves with our lawnmower. When I finished, I looked her in the eye and then abruptly turned and rolled my lawnmower away. 

Yes I know that was rude. But, it was much better than saying all the angry things that I wanted to say to both her and her husband. I had made my point without opening my mouth. 

Here is the bliss part. They have not bothered me since. There is no yelling my name across the property line and following it up with some tedious comment about the weather. There is no having to hear about all the things they are spending their money on, and all the people they are hiring to improve their house and property. And there is no venturing unwanted into my yard. What there is, this spring, is a whole lot of lovely peace and quiet while I putt around my garden. Boy, I am really enjoying this bliss.

Thank you for reading

Photos: Big Bear, By John Balloue, Cherokee. (Detail)

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27 thoughts on “Ignorance Is Bliss”

  3. I remember you writing about your past ecounter with the police officer neighbor. It doesn’t get much more thoughtless than his wife’s tasteless remark. You are wise to cut your ties with these people.

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  6. How rude!
    It’s hard to imagine anyone wanting to live next to those people.
    Glad you’ve found a way to live, somewhat, in peace bedside them. I might be tempted to blow my leaves on their lawn. just because.
    😉

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  7. Huh? What’s wrong with this woman? She automatically assumed that I couldn’t handle the house on my own were my husband end up in a care facility in the future. That’s presumptuous in the least, rude in the most. You handled it well, but why did you have to? People suck…

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  8. We have a divorced female neighbor of about 16 years. During those years, she’s probably spoken to us a half a dozen times, but feels free to watch our every move out her windows and even admitted to videotaping us while working on projects. When we do our spring flower containers, she magically produces the same flower only in plastic format to be installed in all of her containers and hanging baskets. Over the years, we’ve developed a sense of humor about it, but it’s still weird. I’m not sure why some folks want to create an uncomfortable atmosphere for living next door to each other, but they certainly do.

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  11. We have a farm down the road and the farmer’s wife is exactly like your two – luckily her husband, the farmer, is fine and everyone in our small village gets on with him. But just about everyone in our small village avoids her like the plague! It’s got so bad now that even workman who call here know about her and to avoid her and, if they need to go into the field behind our houses, catch the farmer on his own away from her!

    I think you’re doing the mature and correct thing by the way and I don’t consider it rude. It’s a rather diplomatic way of dealing with the situation and has the advantage of putting them in the picture at the same time!

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  12. WOW Jennifer, this is unbelievable & I am so sorry to hear that you had to go through this but I am so proud that you stood up to these bullies. I guess they didn’t realize who they were dealing with!!

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