Is This Where We Are Now?

As of this writing, Election Day has not yet happened and I hope by Thursday’s distribution of the paper we have some results. Are votes still being counted? Who won the presidency? How did the statewide measures do? I am curious yet apprehensive about what is going to happen afterward.

Based on the voting history of the past couple of decades, I can probably guess how people are feeling after the election: anxious, elated, defeated, frustrated, disgusted and more. I wrote a piece in October 2020 titled, “Let It Begin With Me” that may bring some perspective. Check out https://tinyurl.com/u2x8nfmx. No matter the outcome, it’s time to return to calm conversations. Life is too short to live in such a high emotional state. We should be able to just talk to each other.

Speaking of which, I have a neighbor story that has me scratching my head.

We have lived in our home in La Crescenta for 28 years, on a quiet street with great neighbors. Typical of many neighborhoods, we’ve had some issues over the years, but most disputes have been easily resolved with a quick discussion between houses or at the front porch.

Our relationships with neighbors have always been cooperative. On the west side of our property is a mature oak tree. The large trunk sits on the neighbor’s side, but half of the tree reaches into our yard. While we are allowed to trim parts of the tree that overhang the fence within the guidelines of protected oaks, we never do. Instead, every five years or so, both families together hire a professional company to shape the whole tree. It makes sense to split the cost of tree trimming since we each benefit from the oak’s beauty and cool shade.

On the east side of the yard, there is a concrete block wall on the property line. At one point, a portion of the wall cracked and had to be replaced. Our neighbor asked if we would be willing to pay half the cost for someone to repair the broken portion, which we felt was only fair. We were relieved that the whole wall didn’t need to be rebuilt at a time when construction costs were high and are grateful that the neighbors addressed the problem in a friendly manner.

After the last big windstorm, we noticed that our wood fence on the back side of the property was leaning. Upon closer inspection, we realized it needed attention so we bought materials to make basic repairs while we decided on the plan to replace it. Since we have chain-link on the oak tree side and concrete block on the other, we thought it would be nice if everything matched; regardless, it was going to be expensive.

While we were weighing our options, we received a certified letter in the mail from our third neighbor whose driveway borders our rear fence. We have never seen, let alone met, these neighbors so we were surprised to get an unsigned letter apparently from them, informing us that we had 30 days to repair our fence. In addition, the letter stated that if we wanted to enter their property while making repairs, we would need permission in advance and to pay for any plants that might be damaged. What the heck? This is not the type of neighbor interaction we were used to and we were quite taken back. It seemed especially out of line since these same neighbors recently subjected the entire neighborhood to three-to-four years of very loud construction noise. We never complained.

The end of the story is that the fence has been shored up and we will be replacing it soon without asking anyone to share the cost. The funny thing is, they didn’t need to send us a threatening letter to get us to do the right thing. We could have had a nice chat about it – as well as shoot the breeze about the upcoming election.

Susan Bolan
susanbolan710@gmail.com