Neighbours, experiences and general chat

I'm letting off steam by talking about my neighbours.  Others are welcome to join with their problems/experiencesHugging

I know some of us have big problems dealing with our neighbours. There is a recent thread about serious harassment.

I and my family have always had problems with our neighbours.  Often it's our fault, sometimes it's the eccentric/nutty neighbours with their peculiar habits.  An additional problem was language.  Both my parents were WWIi refugees from eastern Europe, and they never learnt to speak adequate English.  Much of their behaviour was trying to disguise that fact because they were secretly ashamed of it.

At present I live in a first floor flat and I get the feeling my neighbours are shunning me.  No surprise.  I'm anti social, I talk to myself and take photographs from my windows of the local wildlife.

Previously I lived with my parents in house with a large garden. And They had more mental health issues than me.  On that Street we were shunned by the normal residents Relieved

One neighbour who I never spoke with used to hide as I walked past.  At that time I was either studying or working away from home and came home once a week or two weeks.  As I walked past his house,  I noticed a quick swift movement as he hid behind a tree or went round the side of his house.  I finally found out the reason for this on the day of his funeral!!!!

Another neighbour who I will call Mrs K was an eccentric,. Spoke my mother's language and at one time used to visit us up to 4 times a day.  On her way to church, on her way home.  On her way to the shops, on her way home.  She was always stressed out, in a bad mood and depressing.  Short conversations were complaining about her next door neighbour (FOR TWENTY YEARS) what time he comes in at night, knocking nails, moving furniture, his drunken tenants, his gardening, him sitting outside his house enjoying the sunshine.  My mother joked, " if he farts in his own house, she will come round here and complain about it".  Other news she always have us from her daily church visits.  Were, who's died and when's the funeral.

I avoided her as much as possible.  Eventually she fell out with my mother over trivia and didn't visit or speak to her again for ten years, until they both past away in the same month.

Then we had a Mrs M.  Very different from Mrs K.  This woman became a pest.  Started of very well.  She was very sociable and smiling and first time I spoke to her she told me. 'your family is not very popular on this street' that was an understatement.

Physically she was very healthy.  But mentally unstable,. She started coming round every day and complaining that people wouldn't talk to her, were shunning her etc.  Whenever I was doing something in the garden or external house maintenance, she came round with a big smile, round face, hypnotic voice and very very strong eye contact .  And started a conversation that just wouldn't end.  Often about families, their health, holidays, relationships, who married to who, have they brothers and sisters, children, school. Work, etc etc etc.  And this repetitive conversation would go on for well over an hour and then she came round a day or two later and repeated the whole boring conversation all over again and again and again.

No wonder people were avoiding her.  Mrs K used to cross the road whenever she saw her in the distance.

When I moved out into a flat, she just kept on phoning me in a bad temper with the same conversation and always complaining that I don't phone her often enough.  Until I changed my phone number.

End of rant for now.  Need breakfast.

  • ...and probably none of it is true! With our Miss J, it was true but nobody knew about it while she was alive because her good neighbour and friend, kept the secret confidential and we only found out years after her death.

  • This naturally brings me to another neighbour.

    The moral of this story is that dirt sticks.

    For this to make sense, one has to understand that I am anti-social and reclusive and I discover gossip long after other people.

    Mrs A lived between Mrs M and Mr P.  She passed away peacefully aged 94 in 2014.  I think in all these years I only spoke to her twice.  However Mrs M, who hated her invited me to her funeral.

    At the funeral I sat with the neighbours and the gossip about her shocked even me.  Whatever happened with not speaking ill of the dead ?

    It turns out that she was widowed in 1975 and the neighbours at that time suspected that she may have murdered her husband, how she had mysterious gentleman callers, and nobody was aware of her husband being ill.  none of the 1975 neighbours were around now, but the rumours started then and were past down to  newcomers who moved in in later years.  I heard all this for the first time,  in whispers at the back of the church at her funeral.  I'm still shocked at these people's behaviour.

  • Yeah, I miss my old street as well and although my mum and dad still live there most of the previous neighbours, who were there when I was growing up, have now left the street.  We had one older lady who was very proper indeed, called Miss J. She used to have a gentleman caller, a GP, and we found out years later, he was her lover! Shocking news! Lol! 

  • I miss my old Street and the characters, just as I was starting to get to know the people I had to move when the house was sold.

    Another sad, very sad story.  To understand then one needs to know more background. 

    We lived on the corner of a main Street and a cul dear sac, which had  a couple of blocks of flats at the end.

    We moved there in 1979 and two of the regular passers by were a couple who we saw almost every day.  I never spoke to them but knew they lived in the flats.  I learnt from Mrs M ( who knew everything about everybody). That they both worked part time in the same pub.  They were always walking together for around thirty years.

    Around 2010 the lady died, Mrs M said it was stomach cancer.  The partner went to pieces.  Previously he was smartly dressed, quiet and always walking with her.  Now he was walking around the street all day totally intoxicated, dishevelled, crying openly and looking twenty years older.  This went on for around a month.  Then we never saw him again.  Don't know what happened to him.

    But I will always remember the shock at seeing him age 20 years in days.

  • Sorry... I forgot to write that, due to certain problems, I did not see your Post until a few hours ago, although the Post shows "2 Days ago". Even my own reply (and probably this one) no longer correctly show upon my device. Thanks again, really.

  • I should reply to this and write a sort of "Thank You", yet I do not know what to reply or to write apart from a sort of "Thank You". So... well, there that is, then....(!)

  • As is invited, I share some other things about "neighbours" (partly written three days ago). I do not know about ND and NT people being more interesting than the other or not, yet I can certainly write about my own experiences (until my E-Reader stops me!)...

    There is/was a person nearby whom I call "Shuffling Man" (!). I have seen him not, for a month now, yet perhaps shall do so after this highlight (!). "Shuffling Man" may have been Autistic; yet why I mention him is that, upon sight of him, man woman and child alike, would fuss over him, and look after him, and he was greatly cared about...
    "ShufflingMan" had no trouble with anyone... except whenever he saw ME!! Even if I was upon the other side of the road, behind a fence, or in a crowd - he would stop dead, stare, yell something (sometimes a greeting, sometimes the most horrendous language imaginable), turn this way and that, step away and step back... all of this until I was out of his sight. I always had to hide from "ShufflingMan", yet when taken by surprise - such as rounding a corner - I had to stand still and turn my back... or just RUN.
    End of that story, here.

    I wrote this next part three days ago. Yet note my use of *Past Tense*...
    I used to have a certain pair of "neighbours" (all NT), whom had at least Six/Eight children... and these children were so-very "well behaved", that they had to put BARS in their kitchen window, and that the police were invited to this house upon very many occasions.
    To leave where I (am forced to) live, there was no other route for myself but to pass this house, with these children, and they would see myself as a safe zone in order to practise throwing stones, abuse, littering, vandalism, intimidation, and all such things.
    When anyone (never myself) spoke to the "Mother", she would only say: "...What have they done NOW?"
    End of that second story, here.

  • Ahhhh and I agree, I love eccentric ND's, they certainly do make the world a better place and they are usually the only people I want to communicate with. I hope Mr P died in his sleep, peacefully, without fear or pain. I'm sending some love up to him and I hope his memory lives on in the minds of the many people he must have helped over the years. God rest Mr P.

  • Absolutely, no one has the right to judge her or anybody else for how we live our lives.


  • Good Evening from DC / 'Oh No it is DC again!' (Please delete where applicable.)

    In being invited to (Please delete where applicable), and if you will forgive me ~ taking the liberty of using a bit of creative licence also:

    "Good Evening from DC"

    "Oh wow ~  it's DC again!"


  • NT neighbours are boring.  It's the eccentrics/ND/***** that give life it's flavour and colour.

    Another unusual/sad case.  Sad the way it ended! Was Mr P.  On the street I lived on until recently.

    He was a power walker.  We saw him at all times of day in all weathers walking very swiftly always having a plastic supermarket bag in his right hand.  He was very alert full of energy full of of purpose.   walking very fast.  I could never keep pace with him.

    On bin days I always set my alarm clock to 6:55am. Put on shoes and a jacket and went out to take the wheelie bins from inside the gate onto the public pavement.  And Mr P was always passing by at that time, full of energy and purpose.  Brief cheery hello and he was gone.

    While I was  eating breakfast around 9am, we saw him coming home.  I mentioned it to my mother, he goes out at 7 back at 9, that's a short trip.  She corrected me.  No. He goes out at 7am every day.  Comes back at 7:30am.  Out at 8am back at 9am.  This is his second trip of the day.  And this power walking went on all day.

    Nice chap, never said or did anything to harm us. but I never really knew him.

    After I left that Street, I got a phone call from Mrs M that he had passed away.  Another neighbour had found him lying in the street bleeding from a head wound.  They helped him get back to his house and he refused offers to call a doctor or an ambulance.  A week later his family concerned about his silence went to visit him and found him dead.

    At his funeral I finally found out about his life.  He was a chess fanatic.   In the 1960s he had served as secretary of the British chess society.

    He graduated from Oxford with a degree in French and Russian.

    He took a master's in librarianship in Sheffield.

    Spent his entire working life in Leeds university library with responsibility for eastern European and Slavonic studies.

    Being fluent in Russian he often accompanied Russian chess grandmasters around UK chess tournaments.

    His power walking only started after he was given early retirement.

  • My attitude is that as long as she doesn't hurt anyone or go out of her way to annoy people.

    Her life is her business.

  • It sounds like there was some kind of ritualistic and obsessive behaviour going on, possibly linked to autism. The doctors etc had very little understanding back then of autism so one can only hope that her rituals made her feel safe and happy. 

  • P.S. thanks for asking the question about why the neighbour used to hide. 

  • Disallowed Cynosure, you’re doing great with the chat and as Deepthought said, it gets easier and less stressful with more and more practice. I hope you keep practicing. 

    I also hide from people as well sometimes - sometimes it’s just too much to deal with people. 

    I’m very sorry that people think it’s ok to throw stones at other people. I think it’s a sign that we are not educating our young in the things that matter. This kind of behaviour has been going on for a long time and I have noticed that primary schools are now teaching kids about respect and kindness etc and I hold the vision of a world where we are all kind to each other. 

  • Robert, I absolutely love your stories. Honestly, I would buy a book with all your stories in or you could make it into a blog - people would be signing in everyday to hear more stories! I love em.

  • Other strange behaviour from neighbours. This is before I was born.  My mother when she was old did a lot of reminiscing about the past.

    When they moved into their first house, she spent time looking at the neighbours house across the road.  And noticed that one middle aged woman was constantly checking her multiple locks.

    This woman would lock the door.  Check the handle, check all the locks with keys.  Unlock all the locks, open the door, close the door, lock all the locks, check the door,.  And kept repeating the process over and over again for around half an hour. Locking, unlocking, closing, opening, checking.!!!!!!!

    Finally she squatted on top of the stone stairs and urinated on the door with piss flowing down the stone stairs and went out.

    I wonder, was she autistic with some kind of rituals and obsessive behaviours?

  • Robert123, said:

    "I mentioned for the first time to my mother the way this man kept hiding from me whenever I walked past.

    She immediately responded, that's because your father sings to him as he walks past his house.

    I asked, sings what?

    And,... This rhymes in Polish better than English.

    "I'm up here, you're down there. I have your Ukraine up my B#**&Y  A#*e".

    A couple of weeks later I came across his widow in her garden and I apologised to her."

    Absolute fair play to you Robert123, nice one.

  • Thanks Muchly, Mister DeepThought... all I can say is... it is a digression and a good thing that a (confusing to myself) sub-topic of the Title of this Thread is "General Chat"?
    I myself would prefer this sort of thing upon either the NAS Suggestions Site or the Autism +NAS Thread which I began...
    But also...
    It is now <> 02.30 hours upon a Tuesday morning, and so I must sign off, now.
    But also...
    NAS is UPDATING tomorrow! So I may stay away from this whole thing for a whole another bit of a whole time! Fair Play to yourself and to all who read.