On Being a Good Neighbor

On Saturday I was blowing and raking leaves for about 2 hours to clear a path to bring the auger through to dig the fence post holes. While I was at it, I thought I would do a good deed, and blow my grouchy neighbor Keith's backyard leaves as well.

Just a reminder, Keith is the next door neighbor we speak little of, because it is always bad news when he is involved. He puts up "no parking" signs across his yard when I have garage sales. He cremated his Shi Tzu, and once, I threw a baby shower, and he came over screaming that someone was parked on his lawn, and then harassed all of my guests when they left. Oh wait..that has happened TWICE. Loser.

Anyway, today I decided to be a nice neighbor and blow their backyard leaves into the woods behind both of our homes. It just seemed like the right thing to do.

WRONG.

"Mrs. Keith" came outside and screamed at me that I am not a Christian and I need to keep the leaves in my yard.

HUH?

I turned off the leaf blower to realize that she was not screaming because of the noise of the blower...she was just, well, just screaming.

Holy Drama Batman.

I told her I was actually blowing ALL the leaves FOR her, (which was obvious, since I was nearly done and her yard looked great, while mine was still under 2 feet of leaves) like as a service, but that I'd be happy to stop if she wished.

Mrs. Keith: You're going to blow ALL of them?
Meg: I had planned to, until you started yelling.

Mrs. Keith: I didn't know that. If you'll blow ALL of the leaves in my yard, then keep going.

Meg: {seriously?! no sorry I bit your head off?} I'm working on it.

Mrs. Keith: Wait. What are you DOING anyway?
Meg: We are putting up a 6 foot privacy fence around the perimeter of our yard.

Mrs. Keith: Oh well we will enjoy that very much.

Meg: Excellent. Feel free to let us know if you'd like to contribute.

Mrs. Keith: Contribute? To what?

Meg: Contribute. FINANCIALLY. To the fence you are going to enjoy so much. Let us know anytime if you'd like to contribute to the cost.

She got in her car and drove away without another word.
Yeah. That's what I thought.

If you don't want to help PAY for the fence, then you can just shut up.

...until I am done blowing all of your leaves.
...and then you can tell me thank you and we can be civil neighbors.