When cutting down trees stirs up a ’hornets nest’...

[rayinpenn]

A few months ago I removed the first in a line of pine trees. A 40 footer encroaching on the driveway and making a mess on the cars. The remaining pine trees were sun starved, unbalanced and not pretty. Two days later the neighbors plant two scrawny trees to block the mess and the husband blast me with a vulgar comment about how ugly it is.

A couple days ago i had the remaining trees be removed. When I left for 1/2 hour to hit the bank the neighbor came over and complained that they were dropping the logs on his side and he was trying to grow grass. Further they should take the rope off his property.. except he was quite vulgar.. funny but i watched the process and the guys were as careful as you could be. Well when the trees were down i made an effort to clean it all up. I put down seed and topsoil. I also cleaned up around the green house. Still 4 giant pine tree stumps ground up creates a huge pile of mulch. My guys neatly created a place where ill plant possibly the rose of Sharon as a hedge(still figuring what would be a good hedge)

The rubbish pile i put out in the usual spot was a decent size. I put it out early Tuesday morning pickup is Wednesday because we would be away from home Tuesday night.

Tuesday afternoon I get a text from the neighbor that my rubbish was on his side and he was trying to grow grass and to move it. I respond telling him I was away and was sorry but i was trying to clean up the mess. Had a lot of rubbish and I was away... etc.,

The odd thing is there is a big bare spot there for some time where he had a tree removed.

At 64.5 I am too old for petty nonsense.. recently I’ve heard some angry, scary yelling from over there. No idea what’s going on but his wife seems to be a reasonable nice person.

I am thinking i wont “get into it with him..” no matter how unreasonable he is...

 

[Jerry1]

I wish people like that could see how much damage that stress they inflict on themselves causes. Such a shame and sorry you end up having to deal with that. I would have been over there with a couple of beers and watched the guys working. I love those big stump grinders. Talk about a mean machine. One day I hope your neighbor realizes that grass grows whether you try or not. Have you ever seen a field that wasn’t green? All you really have to do is kill the weeds. And relax.

 

[Teacher Terry]

He is a total idiot!

 

[rayinpenn]

He is a total idiot!

There’s no requirement that you be friendly with your neighbors and he’s was at least cordial prior to these incidents. There was however some strong language about his neighbor on the other side selling his house too cheaply. He’s never been a big lawn maintenance guy prior to this.. I wonder 70 years old, 2 of them in that big house.. Is he looking to sell?

The properties are big (1 Acre) and since I removed the trees the space and vistas in the back yard are amazing. My greenhouse is now full sun. There is still a huge area with the grass coming back where the pool once stood but a few me weeks and that will disappear.

I’ll keep cleaning up the woods back there but I’m not going to try to not worry about a nasty guy. He is his own worst enemy.

Somethings up. I don’t know what but there is. They’ve had there challenges over there: The Mrs. Cancer, a vey bad back and a new knee ..then they were robbed a few years ago.. then there was the garden hose that was mysteriously cut? All too odd.

 

[albireo13]

Some people seem to enjoy being miserable .. always looking for something to complain about.

 

[mystang52]

Some people seem to enjoy being miserable .. always looking for something to complain about.

This.

 

[Mykle57]

Ray,
You sound like a reasonable guy.
Why wouldn't you have alerted the neighbors beforehand that you were having some tree work done near the property line? And that (with his approval) you'd take care of anything that might accidentally fall into his side.

That's what I'd hope my neighbor does.

 

[aja8888]

People getting old with things not quite going their way, sometimes get cranky. At 75 1/2, I have to fight the urge to stay calm and sane in a lot of petty circumstances.

And with DW's poor medical condition, she is always tense and can jump on me if I irritate her even a bit.

This stuff happens.

 

[Dawg52]

People getting old with things not quite going their way, sometimes get cranky. At 75 1/2, I have to fight the urge to stay calm and sane in a lot of petty circumstances.

I noticed this with my parents. Old and probably not feeling well. I'm trying to remind myself of this so I don't talk bad to my dog as I age.

 

[rayinpenn]

Mykle57
“Ray,
You sound like a reasonable guy.
Why wouldn't you have alerted the neighbors beforehand that you were having some tree work done near the property line? And that (with his approval) you'd take care of anything that might accidentally fall into his side.

That's what I'd hope my neighbor does.”


You are absolutely right about possibly alerting him but given his comments a about how ugly they were and “looks like %^&*” I thought he’d be happy to see them go. Plus it all happened fast.

My 21 year old tree guy is just out of school for the summer. Goes to a trade school for landscaping trees etc. Swung by to say hello and see how the pool grass was coming.. there were 2 ‘leaner trees’ in the woods that the Mrs felt were a disaster waiting to happen. I causally asked him what he’d want to take down the ‘leaners’ and the 4 monster pines. Well $2,400 a great deal (he knew he made good money on them pool) bam i said do it..

I am think, and i may well be wrong.. my neighbor is an unhappy guy who has a hard time with empathy... he simply see’s being treated unfairly. Which was not my intention at all...

 

[aja8888]

I noticed this with my parents. Old and probably not feeling well. I'm trying to remind myself of this so I don't talk bad to my dog as I age.

Lately, my dog is the only person that I feel good with. We walk 4 or 5 times per day.

 

[ShokWaveRider]

It is posts like this..... and the other one, that makes me so happy about where we live and our neighbors. We have been here over 10 years now and have had no such issues. We are sorry others have so many annoying neighbors. It is not really hard for people to be cordial, even if there are issues, healthy friendly discussion can solve a lot of petit disputes.

 

[Mdlerth]

I'd call it a big "yes"

"Are your neighbors insane?"

https://www.early-retirement.org/forums/f27/are-your-neighbors-insane-97900.html

 

[Ronstar]

... It is not really hard for people to be cordial, even if there are issues, healthy friendly discussion can solve a lot of petit disputes.

True. My neighbors came over one day concerned over a dead tree between our properties. The trunk was 7’ inside my property. They were afraid that it would fall on their shed. It could have also have fallen on my workshop.

We talked it over and I agreed to pay for the removal and the neighbors agreed to allow the tree guys to remove it from their side of the line.

It’s good to talk these things over with the neighbors

 

[harllee]

RayinPenn, I sympathize with you. I can take a lot but when someone uses vulgar language toward me I really don't like it. We do not use foul language at home and I never heard it growing up. I have trouble watching TV or movies with vulgar language (so I don't watch much). I wonder if the neighbor has always been this way or if it is something new? He could be developing dementia. If it were me, this first time the neighbor used vulgar language toward me would be the last time I ever tried to communicate with him. I would ignore him from now on, block his phone number, etc.

 

[The Cosmic Avenger]

If there wasn't already a saying "Good fences make for good neighbors", I think rayinpenn would have coined it here and now!

IMO, it sounds like the neighbor is either mistaken about the placement of the property boundary, or is just a bit of a control freak and wants to have a say in what you do on your property. Have you had a survey done? We had one done before we put up our fence...and we discovered that the neighbor's existing fence slanted onto our property! We graciously volunteered to have our fence guys move the existing fence back behind the property line before we started work on our fence. (This was the drug-dealing neighbor mentioned in the other thread.) It was only about 2-3% the cost of the new fence, and we wanted to make them an offer they couldn't refuse and just get it over with...we had already been to court with this neighbor once.

 

[Teacher Terry]

At one point in time we had terrible neighbors. Now they are great and we feel lucky.

 

[skipro33]

When people use foul language towards me, I ALWAYS stop them right then and there, at the word, and tell them that I will not tolerate that sort of language towards me. Almost always, they apologize and are contrite, rethink what they want to tell me, and proceed in a calm manner. If they don't, I walk away.
It's important that you ignore your neighbor when he abuses you after he's been informed you won't allow anyone to speak to you in that manner. Then follow up and ignore any sort of contact from then forward.

When people swear, they are trying to get a reaction from you or they have lost control of their emotions. In either case, conversing with one as such is encouragement, so don't.