Where we are living now can best be described as a Dennis the Menace neighborhood. Big houses, big families, a lot of neighborly waiving, kids playing in their yards behind fences, people walking their dogs and landscapers blocking the roads. Sounds nice, right? Ehhhhh, I'm not so sure.
Let's look at the differences between living in the sort of ghetto and living in the legit suburbs.
Neighbors: In the ghetto, our neighbors were families, mostly ethnic, some college kids, a few single people and a rooming house down the street. This meant there was a variety of experiences on a daily basis. It was loud. Really loud. There were lots of parties. College parties, ethnic celebrations. There were bagpipes and fireworks and, every once in a while, something that could be gunshots. There were a lot of domestic disturbances, kids playing in the streets and stray animals. One time, we heard passionate sex coming from a Honda Civic outside of our bedroom window. For hours. On Christmas. My favorite activity was to sit in front of my window and just watch the weirdos walking back and forth down the street.
In the suburbs, neighbors are friendly. Too friendly. Accusingly friendly, even. In the ghetto, aside from the people downstairs and the girl across the street who I work with, I never spoke to anyone. I didn't know most people's names. Every once in a while I would talk about the weather with the old man who stole our recycling every Thursday, but that was it. In the new place I am forced to talk to someone every single time I go outside. There is Kim and Tom next door or Bobby across the street or super fit cop man a few houses down, or Bob the retired guy behind us. Someone ALWAYS has something to say. And it is never just 'Hello'. Remember the clan of 15 Portuguese Hell Freaks that lived upstairs from us when we first moved in? They have been replaced by a small yuppie, Christian, home school family. They are very nice and very quiet, but they talk to me. A lot. I'm sorry, I don't want to talk to you. Leave me alone.
The day that I moved in across the street Bobby asked me 1,000 questions about myself. I know it was because he wanted to do a background check. Every single person in this neighborhood is white. There are some Hasidic Jews across the street, but that is about all the culture that we get. Sitting in the window and people watching is boring. Every once in a while I'll see a MILF walking a dog, but even that is rare. Usually it is just some professional white guy walking to the train station with a briefcase or one of the old people on the street waiting for a ride. Great. Reeeeal interesting.
This is also one of those neighborhoods where people knock on your door and try to sell you Girl Scout Cookies and magazine drives. Kim and one of her suburban soccer playing, Girl Scout daughters came over yesterday to deliver the boxes that I awkwardly ordered a few months back. How do you say no? "Hi, neighbor, do you want to buy some cookies?" "No, next door neighbor that I see every day, I don't. I'll pass. I'll disappoint your Old Navy kid and make sure you go home and tell Tom how much of a dick I am." No. You have to buy the damn cookies. So, I bought the damn cookies and they got delivered yesterday. I opened the door and realized that the front hallway was covered in laundry and shoes and old mail. Great. Now the community newsletter will mention our messy hallway. And let's not forget how awkward and socially inept I am. I am not good at making friendly neighbor conversation so we just look at each other in awkward silence until one of us says something about the weather. About the only good thing that came of it was that I was able to learn their last name so I could Facebook stalk them. Yes, I LOVE to Facebook stalk. Make your pages private, people, because I WILL find out what TV shows you like and what music you think is awesome. Sometimes I go on epic Facebook journeys that take me from page to page to page until I am looking at Jane Smith from Nowhere, Arkansas who works at Dr. Jones dental as a receptionist and loves to watch Hell's Kitchen and listen to contemporary Christian music. Wait- I think that lady may have just moved upstairs. Looks like I need to find out her last name. I digress.
Let's talk about the police. Police activity in the ghetto is high. Cruisers drive down the street hourly. They patrol, they scope out, they keep watch. About twice a day they are called somewhere for some reason. Domestics, street fights, illegal fireworks, warrants etc... On fun days, detectives show up and raid houses or arrest serial home invaders. This may seem frightening to some, but the way I look at it is these people live in my neighborhood, they are not going to rob anyone in my neighborhood. You don't break in to your neighbor's house, you drive to the rich part of town and steal TV's and diamond rings from people who don't recognize you. The best part about living in a high crime area is that the police largely leave people like you and I alone. They aren't concerned with me unless I do something to warrant them showing up at my house, or forget to move my car on street cleaning day.
In the suburbs police have absolutely nothing better to do than try to bust people driving through town for trivial, irrelevant traffic violations. I have documented my experiences well and they have not gotten any better. I still get tailed home twice a week. I still see endless amounts of poor souls pulled over all over town, probably just trying to get to work and not realizing that the speed limit on every street is negative four miles per hour. But- don't worry, no matter how fast you were going they will just say it was over 45 mph so they can jack up your ticket another $200. Oh, and don't appeal because no one wants to hear it.
This is one of those communities where people go on vacation and ask the police to 'watch their houses' while they are gone. You know, just in case a black person might wander by or a teenager decides to cut through their yard while he is skipping school. You know, important stuff. Gotta have a police presence. Your tax dollars at work, folks. Police hang out at the Dunkin Donuts inside Stop and Shop and gossip about town issues. About once every seven years something happens that gives the department a few days of notoriety. It is usually something that happens in other communities every day. Like one of their ball-busting traffic stops turns up 25 guns and a kilo of cocaine in the trunk or somebody gets caught diddling his balls at the library. Then they go on the news and justify pulling every third person over because, hey, that one guy had guns and coke in his trunk that one time. Thus, we pull over everyone who runs a yellow light. GOTTA KEEP THE OLD PEOPLE SAFE, FOLKS!
I think there was a murder-suicide a few years ago. That doesn't count. That is a completely unpreventable and unsolvable crime. No one has ever pulled someone over, or checked a neighbor's house and said "Phew, good thing I did that. That guy was about to go home, shoot his wife and then blow his brains out." Case closed on that one.
Honestly, when I lived in the ghetto I never worried about much. But now that I am in the suburbs, I keep a crowbar under my bed. This is where people go to break in to houses. Don't break in to mine. I have a plan. And it involves you not leaving. I've always wanted to make a citizen's arrest. I will crowbar you, put a knee in your neck and yell "THIS IS A CITIZEN'S ARREST" Then I will call super fit Robo Cop from down the street off of his routine traffic stop and he will read in his police manual what to do when arresting someone for something not traffic related and take your bloody head to jail.
Next, utility vehicles. In the ghetto, it was not uncommon to see one or many of the following work trucks on our street. Verizon, Comcast, Dish Network, Roto Rooter, appliance repair, exterminators and delivery vehicles. Also, about three days a week, every week, someone had a UHaul moving in or out of an apartment somewhere. In the suburbs this is an area of great improvement. Here, the majority of street blocking vehicles are landscapers which, while loud, are largely harmless and always leave the house smelling like fresh cut grass. If a utility guy comes, he typically parks in someone's driveway or out of the way. Also, I am pretty sure everyone on our street has a cleaning person but us. Either that or we have a large population of old Spanish women selling vacuum cleaners door to door.
Finally, there is cost of living. Yes, apartments in the ghetto are similar in cost and not nearly as nice. However, utility costs in the suburbs are ABSURD. Like 40-50 percent higher. Even stupid shit like on street parking passes. In the ghetto they were free. In the suburbs they are $30 and you have to give the police the registration number of, not just your car, but that of every single car in your household as well as anyone else who uses the driveway to prove to them that you really "need" the parking pass. I actually risk a ticket by parking on the street just because I don't want any of those bastards knowing that much information about me. And why is it
$30? That makes no sense. It should not cost money to park in front of your own house. For some reason, everything in this town costs money. I am half expecting to get a bill next month charging me for my family's air consumption.
Don't get me wrong, there are some nice things about living on this street. It is pretty quiet, my apartment is very nice, we have a very friendly mailman. We are around the corner from the ocean and, if the neighbors cooperate, I don't have to park on the street. I have a grill and a bird feeder, both things that I have always wanted. I just think I am one of those people that needs to live in a secluded area with a big yard and lots of woods. And no neighbors. I REALLY don't like having neighbors. Like, at all.
What this all comes down to is me needing about $2 million. I won't even quit my job. Just enough to buy a modest house- I don't even need to build one, just buy one that is secluded. Use the rest to go back to school, put my kid through school and teach myself how to restore muscle cars. There are plenty of billionaires out there that spend their money on garbage. You won't miss $2 million. Don't buy a gold-plated lion statue this week. Tell your girlfriend that you can't afford a new Mercedes for her and your wife this year. She'll understand. I'll even work for you. Shit, I'll get your name tattooed on the back of my neck like an advertisement. Just, please, make it so I don't have to talk to my neighbors anymore. Is that too much to ask? I don't think so. I mean, I don't have cancer. My house didn't burn down. But I do have a job. And a college degree. And I pay taxes and I'm not on welfare. At some point someone should be rewarded for living life the right way and getting screwed out of an honest living by society.
How was that? Convincing?
Stalker update
Rock teeth is still stalking me. He texts me several times a week and frequently shows up at work to 'check in' with me even though he never orders anything. In speaking to others, it appears that he does this to other people as well and is known around town for loitering in bars. Loitering. That's the word I'm going to use to kick him out next time I see him. It is getting to the point where I might have to murder him before he murders me. I'll probably get away with it. I'll just have to obey all traffic laws on the way to bury his body.
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