Talking to neighbours

Why bother even speaking to them, unless you have to? We share a very thin wall with our neighbours, whose bathroom abuts our bedroom; so every night at approximately 11:00 we hear one or the other of them ker-CHUNK the pull-string on their bathroom light and then several seconds later hear the toilet flush. Occasionally, very late at night, we hear the man vomit; they like their drink. We've lived in this house for over a year now, and have exchanged probably two brief paragraphs' worth of words with them. It's not that they're not nice folks; they're actually lovely and put out our bins for us when we were on hols. But having to listen to them piss every night deters me from wanting to get to know them any better than, "Hi, how are you?". If it's a struggle to come up with a rotating supply of pleasantries, broosh, I wouldn't bother. Just smile and say 'hi'.

But broosh, like your family members, you can't choose your neighbours; just because you live next door to them doesn't mean you share one single thing in common. If it's an effort to exchange pleasantries with them on account of nothing to say, that might be a good indication that perhaps you are trying too hard to make a relationship where one needn't exist...? That isn't to say be rude and ignore them... then again, this is coming from someone for whom Sartre's bon mot, 'Hell is other people'... is a sort of personal credo...

sorry, I missed an 'o' out. Brooosh.

I've lived next door to the 'bulldog and the walrus' for 34yrs now and they've been arseholes for every single one of them. The only thing I want to say to them is ,'I hear you've both got terminal diseases and have a week to live. How lovely.'

I suffocated one once. He survived, but he's now in a home.

I don't exchange platitudes with mine, but they occasionally leave notes on my car when they think I've parked it in their space.

It's very easy Brooosh, if the weather is nice say 'nice day, isn't it?' If the weather is cold say 'cold, isn't it?' If the weather is warm say 'warm, isn't it?' If it is windy say 'windy, isn't it?' If it is raining say 'wet, isn't it?' And so on. If it wasn't for the weather ninety percent of Englishmen would never say anything to anyone.

"hiya" **smile, wave, head down, walk faster** **half-wave** **nod** **half nod** **totally ignore and let them feel your wrath** wait 'til summer when you'll be half tipsy, chatting over the fence, performing sycnronised, happy mowing on back garden, listening contentedly to each other's windchimes in the evenings, and trying to put ya dingle up the mingle. There's nothing more mind-teasing than the incomprehensible eagerly avowed - Dennett

"If you don't turn your fuckin' music down I'll set fire to your fuckin' kids."

no need for that..just call your local council and get noise pollution levels tested **tut** There's nothing more mind-teasing than the incomprehensible eagerly avowed - Dennett

My own personal approach, wherever I've lived, is to try to get on with the neighbours as best I can - even if I have hardly a thing in common with them (apart, perhaps, from sharing their socio-economic status - which can often be enough, anyway). To me, it's far easier to live with people if you know them - at least to some extent. I've generally found that the more you 'know' people on a friendly level, the easier it is to communicate with them about grievances like noise, cars blocking entrances, etc. I'd also like to think (idealist that I am!) that if you've passed the time of day with someone, gotten to know their name, etc., that it's more likely they'll look out for you, be considerate towards you, and so on. That's generally been my experience, and I've had a lot of addresses over the years in all sorts of neighbourhoods. It doesn't mean you have to be inviting them over for dinner, or trying to get them to join your club, or exchanging birthday cards. I wouldn't want any of my immediate neighbours as friends. My closest neighbour, upstairs, is a raving right-winger and the people renting next door are not the most considerate or quiet crowd. But I do my best to get along with them, so there's give and take. "like your family members, you can't choose your neighbours" What's the old saying? 'God gives us our relatives, thank God we can choose our friends.' I'd go further, Archergirl, and say that most of the people we meet up with every day - neighbours, work colleagues, fellow passengers - aren't people we'd normally choose to be with. Again, though... we ought to be able to find a level at which we can get along with them. As Brooosh says, it's an essential part of civilised life. Yes, it can be very bloody difficult having to get assertive and put people right on things. Doing that the right way first, though - even if it doesn't work - is still better than allowing the anger to fester until it comes out in abuse or worse. No one wins then. If people do things wrong and no one points it out to them, how are they to know? They may not react favourably to being told, of course - but how many of us likes to be criticised, however diplomatically? There are, of course, some shitbags and arseholes who don't give a toss and who seem to make it their life's purpose to bring misery to everyone else. It's stressful having to live with it. What do you do with people like that? How have you managed for 34 years without going barmy or resorting to violence, Missi? (PS this is also coming from someone who shares Sartre's view.... thing is, other people ain't going to go away, so you have to make the best of it)

Ha ha! Well.... maybe on this subject anyway, Brooosh! But that's part of it, too. We don't have to agree with everyone on everything to get along. That, to me, is what being 'civilised' is all about: finding and working on the similarities, rather than stewing on the differences. My right wing neighbour and I get along okay because we generally leave our politics out of things. We know enough about one another to know the measure of one another. If we spoke politics, we'd probably end up arguing. It simply ain't worth it. We all want a quiet life, after all. And we all want to be liked... don't we? I guess my bottom line on the neighbours thing is... does it hurt to give a bit of time? Who knows... maybe they ARE nice, congenial people after all. It's the same with some of the guys I work with. Very much "mens' men". You know... football, cricket, tits, shagging, Jim Davidson. I've never really been that sort of bloke - but I get along with them and we have a few beers and a game of pool together occasionally. We can find a common level. Part of it, with me, is perhaps that all-too-human desire to conform, and to be accepted - even though I've never been much of one for conformity, doing what's expected, etc (also, I'm not by temperament a social animal, and have never found it easy to make friends). But it's mainly about wanting to set aside differences and get along. They probably look upon me as a bit odd at best, a bit of a wanker at worst - but it doesn't bother me. I take the piss out of them as much as they take it out of me, and we laugh it off. And we have that inbuilt mutual respect in our attitude to the work we do. That's what I find endlessly fascinating about human relationships: how people who are dissimilar in all sorts of fundamental senses can still find a common ground. Apart from anything else, it's where part of my impulse to write comes from. On a broader, but related subject... last week's Big Issue carried a feature on Encompass, the project which brings together diverse groups of young people from places like Palestine and Israel (two 'neighbours' who know more than most of us about antagonism and hatred, and the destruction they bring) to see if they can get along. Well worth a look at their work: http://www.encompasstrust.org/

"My own personal approach, wherever I've lived, is to try to get on with the neighbours as best I can" Aye - totally agree, alan. Something I have noticed during the past year which is worrying me: because the housing market is so shitty, and women have stopped having children(?) I've noticed one or two houses (down the close I live in) mortgaged by groups of young men. That no good!!...Can see trouble loomin' !! :) There's nothing more mind-teasing than the incomprehensible eagerly avowed - Dennett