Tuesday, September 7, 2010

Dear new neighbors

Welcome to urban living! In the interest of being a good neighbor, I pulled together some tips and suggestions that will keep you from being a bad neighbor. Nobody wants to be a bad neighbor, right?

First, you are right, the parking spots we have are quite narrow. I know this well, truly I do; the lack of space goes hand in hand with urban living. Be glad you picked a home in the South End and not the North End, where the parking is much worse.

I know you want to back into your spot but you can’t do that. Your spot has a fence along the right side and if you back in, you'll pull too far over into my spot plus you’ll block my back patio gate entirely. That’s the door we use every day and we have to be able to get in and out through there. So pull head on into your spot, and make sure you hug the fence. You'll want to plan ahead and let out any front seat passenger you have before you park, and you'll want to put groceries etc either behind you or in your trunk. Finally, fold in your rear-view mirrors.

Next up are the security lights you turned on last Thursday and haven’t turned off since. You probably don't realize those lights illuminate our patio as though it were a prison; to make things worse, that light then travels down the hall to our bedroom. We are grateful we can shut our curtains and don’t have to deal with the direct light of the bulbs. That's not true for the people in the buildings across the alley. Really, it's a simple solution: Turn off the lights and leave them off. We’ve got a city light fixture already going out there, we don’t need more light.

Finally, please make sure your construction crew vacates my parking spot before 6:30 PM. It’s really not cool that one of us has to go to your place and get their attention and then deal with their attitude about moving their van. After all, they can use your spot.

Love and kisses,

Elizabeth

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