Someone is calling my name or something close to it.

“Hey mother fucker!”

That seems to be sufficiently normal nowadays.

I turn and give a nod to my neighbor, watch as he throws trash on my lawn.

“This is yours.”

“It’s litter,” I say. “The wind blows it from the street.”

“Right. You can blow me.”

I consider it but he is not my type.

He goes on.

“Keep your trash off my property or I’ll kill you.”

So polite. So kind. So reliable.

We all need good neighbors. Too bad we don’t always get them.

Mr. Muscle Head gets in his pick up truck and drives away.  I get a trash bag. I clean up all the slop he dumped on my lawn. I go to the curb in front of my house and pick up the dog crap on the sidewalk and grass strip next to the street. I figure it is from Muscle Head’s dog.  He has a rottweiler. Walks it twice a day. The pair of them like to linger in front of my house. I guess neither of them has the wind for a long walk. I pick up the cigarette butts too. I don’t smoke. Muscle Head does. But so do people who walk and drive by who flick the remains of their smokes without caring where they land.

Later Muscle Head is banging on my door. I open the door a crack. He tries to shove trash through the crack. Fast food wrappers and an empty cigarette pack.

“I told you keep your stuff off my lawn.”

I push the trash back at him.

“I’m not McDonalds or Burger King or Wawa.  I don’t buy that shit. And I don’t smoke.”

“Don’t give me that bullshit. I know it’s you.”

I’ve called the police before. The cops never do anything about it.  They probably never will unless the asshole actually runs after me with a gun. Even then they probably won’t do anything unless someone captures it on video or I get shot.

I called the District Attorney about filing a private criminal complaint. That’s what you are supposed to do when the cops just shrug and stand around looking like they just missed the short bus. The DA’s office referred me to some goody-goody group that helps with disputes between neighbors. They sent a letter to Muscle Head about “mediation” of our “dispute”.  Muscle Head ripped the letter up in front of me.  The would be mediators told me they couldn’t do anything more. Participation in their program was voluntary. I thought about buying a gun but that could turn me into another asshole. One on the block is enough. Too bad he’s not the only one. Just the most obnoxious. I love my neighbors. We’re supposed to, right?

I try to be calm and explain to my neighbor again how people litter and the wind blows trash around. I make the logic as simple as possible, simple enough for any asshole to follow.

“It’s not me. I don’t throw trash on your property or anyone else’s. I’m the one who goes around every morning before work picking up trash off the sidewalk in front of our homes. By the time I get home from work there is always more trash. There’s a strip mall with stores and fast food places two blocks from here. People walk by and drop trash. People drive by and toss their trash out their car windows. Any breeze, even from passing cars, can send it up onto the lawns. Get a security camera. You’ll see I’m telling the truth.”

Muscle Head yells some more and puffs out his chest. He takes a breath and yells some more. I let him rant. Eventually he gets tired and goes home. Things are quiet for a day or two.

Saturday morning he’s back at my door. Banging.

“Your cat pooped in my garden again. I’m sick of it. Stop letting it into my yard or I’m going to poison it.”

“I don’t own a cat.”

“Don’t lie to me. I see it walking around your yard.”

“What does it look like?”

“Black and white.”

“That belongs to a little girl who lives in one of the houses across the back alley. It wanders everywhere. Poops in my yard too.”

“Don’t give me that! It’s you and your cat.”

I come out of the house and point to the row of house behind our homes.

“Look,” I point. “Third house from the corner.”

A black and white cat is staring out the back window of the house on the second floor.

“Oh,” he says. “Who owns that place?”

“You know the guy with the Harley and the pickup?”

“The big guy? Lots of tattoos?”

“Yeah. He seem okay. Quiet family. Only make noise around Memorial Day when some of his biker buddies come by for a barbecue. Maybe you should talk to him about the cat.”

Muscle Head grows quiet.

“He has lot of guns doesn’t he? That’s what I heard.”

             “I don’t know if he has a lot. I know he has a rifle and a compound bow.  I think he likes to hunt.”

“Likes to hunt?  Guess he can’t be so bad.”

“Why don’t you talk to him? The two of you might hit it off.”

“Never mind,” he says. “We had a run in a while back. I don’t need his kind of trouble.”

“What about the cat?”

“I guess the crap might help the flowers grow.  I can bury it.”

My neighbor hasn’t been as annoying since then. He only yells at me once in a while about litter or how high my grass is or about laundry hanging in my back yard on a line or the type of music I play or listen to or the smell of my cooking or the types of friends who come to visit.

Other neighbors have occasionally made similar complaints, but no one is as vocal or as consistent as dear Mr. Muscle Head next door.

I could put up with him as a neighbor if I really tried, but I really don’t feel like trying anymore. I don’t need to either. I don’t need to put up with Muscle Head or any of my other neighbors.

My mother is getting on in years. She lives alone in small house in a town forty five minutes away. It is getting harder for her to be by herself. It’s not the house I grew up in, but its a good house in a quiet neighborhood. I prefer quiet. I want to be the source of the noise; not someone else.

Mom asked me before to move in with her, but I made excuses. I have a sister but she married, moved to another state, and had a bunch of kids.  Moving in with sis was never a real option for mom. There’s no space in my sister’s house for her. Every bedroom is filled. And the two of them have been getting on each others nerves since sis learned to talk.

Moving into my house was never an option either. Mom’s never liked my neighborhood or my neighbors or the number of steps outside. She told me when I bought the place that I was making a mistake. I will never let her know that she may have been right. I don’t want to lose my dignity more than I already have.

I do a lot of things that my mom doesn’t like. I have my bad habits. Anyone who knows me can talk about them. Mom says she can put up with my quirks. I don’t consider them real shortcomings, but others might. None of them are life-threatening. Mom couldn’t tolerate my idiosyncrasies when I was young, and I couldn’t tolerate hers. Now she says she’s okay with who I am. It’s not like she has a lot of choice. It’s me or no one. Or me or a nursing home. Guess I’m better than that. And I am older and more mellow than I was. She is too. I think I can put up with my mother now, or tune her out better. I think she’s willing to do the same.

I have decided the right thing to do is say yes, and move in with my mom. She took care of me when I was young. Now it’s my turn to keep an eye on her. I’ll still be able to get to work from her place. It will just take a bit longer to commute.

As for my house, I am not going to sell it. I am going to put it up for rent. I don’t want to rent it to just anyone. I want to find a tenant my neighbor, Mr. Muscle Head, and the rest of my neighborhood, deserves. Someone who has problem child written all over them, but has steady income and decent credit.  A thug with a cat and a dog and worse habits than mine would be nice, if they can afford the lease. 

I have thought about making it a real bargain if the right character comes along. But that would be a last resort. I’ll try for a balance of good cash and karma first. I’ll listen to my heart and my bank book before I make any final decisions.

I would like justice in some way with a tenant. I would like to give back to those who gave so much to me, unasked for and unwarranted. All the bullshit that came from living near them, especially Mr. Muscle Head.

Part of me says I shouldn’t care if a tenant burns the place down. Or burns down the whole neighborhood. That’s why you buy insurance.  The saner part of my brain tells me not to wish for anything like that. It would create too many headaches.

The best I can probably hope for is someone annoying in the property, but not too dangerous. Someone who will make everyone on the block feel as “welcome” as I did. More or less.

Who knows how that will work out. So much is unpredictable. The asshole I choose might be happier there than I was. The neighbors may be happier with with him or her than they were with me. Maybe the renter will fit right in, become everyone’s best buddy, get invited over to watch football and NASCAR, be welcome at all the barbecues,  get asked to go with neighbors to the shooting range, the local dog fight, the local crap game. You name it.

With luck, he or she will get under everyone’s skin more than I did for just being alive.  That would be nice by me. No one gets hurt, but my old neighbors feel uncomfortable, uncomfortable enough to miss my being there. Maybe they will even reminisce about the good old days when I was still their neighbor, a beloved thorn in their side. Maybe looking better and better, with hindsight, as each month living near my successor goes by.