A matter of scale

Mary and I have been trying to decide how to approach the new renters in the house next door. You see, they’re young and act it – staying up late making noise in their backyard, which is more or less under our window. And since the weather has turned nice, they’ve assembled a stone ring and each fair evening finds them burning a bonfire, again more or less under our bedroom window. Wood smoke and sixty-year-old asthmatics don’t mix all that well.

They seem like nice enough young guys, if a bit clueless. And they have a bloodhound that’s to die for. I’m a sucker for a big, galumphy dog. And of course, their arrival means we’re quit of the former renter whose presence was much more problematic for reasons we need not touch on here. Still, the noise and the smoke are annoying, especially at three in the morning. So, we’re going to have to have ‘the talk.’

I’ve been torn between hoping and dreading I’ll find them home each time I come home because while I look forward to having the problem resolved, I really don’t like complaining to neighbors, especially new ones. This whole thing has been weighing on my mind.

Shift focus. I spent a couple hours at the gym today and as I dragged my soaked corpus toward the locker room at the end of the session, my way was blocked by a quickly increasing crowd of first responders working feverishly to restore the heartbeat of one of my fellow overweight exercisers. The poor sap was stretched out on the floor and the display on the monitor which faced toward me did not look hopeful, if my years of watching medical dramas have taught me anything.

TV show miracles notwithstanding, most of the time it’s really not good news when the fireman has to administer CPR. This guy is at best headed for a difficult recovery. I wonder about and hope good things for him but who knows?

What I do know is that this guy’s problem de jour easily eclipses my little problem with the neighbors. I’ll man up and talk to them in the next day or two. After all, it’s not life or death.

(Side note:  Sorry for the silence these past several days. I was teaching in Fargo, ND and while it was a great trip, I didn’t have a lot of time to myself.)