Part of living next to somebody is accepting that there will be a certain level of noise you'll have to put up with -especially if they have kids. That's why one woman was left confused after her neighbour, who she used to have a good relationship with, demanded that her children stop going into their garden as he could hear them when he was on important calls.
Their relationship had deteriorated from putting the bins out for each other and saying hello, to arguing about whether her children were making too much noise, and the fuming mum took to Mumsnet to explain what had happened and why she was so annoyed.
She wrote: "We've come back from holiday to find neighbour has re-organised his home office and he now sits at a massive (open) window right on the boundary between our gardens. That must have been a spare bedroom before maybe, I don't know. We never saw anyone in it.
"I sat outside at our patio table this morning to have a coffee and I could hear every word he said through his open window, could hear every word his colleagues said in their online meetings. He might as well have been sitting at the table with me. Not sure there's much I can do about that, he can use his house however he likes.
"My ten-year-old son and his pals are sitting outside at the table trading Pokemon cards. There are four of them, they are laughing and chatting but they're not shouting or being silly. And it's a sunny afternoon in the school holidays, they can be outside laughing in the garden if they want to be.
"Neighbour has just come to the door to ask me if I can take them inside because he has a full afternoon of work meetings and their noise is distracting him. I said "what, the whole afternoon? You want them to stay indoors all afternoon?" He said completely straight-faced "I'll be working till 6.30pm."
"I laughed and said "well no, that won't be possible". At this point he said in a very slow, careful, mansplaining voice just in case I couldn't follow him "I don't think you understand. I have a Very Important Job. These are very important meetings. I negotiate multi-million dollar contracts every day, I need to be able to concentrate."
"Seriously? I always though he was a bit of a t*** but who talks like this? Who actually says "Very Important" like that? Twice? He has no idea what my job is or how important my husbadn or I might be.
"I just said "no, we'll carry on using our garden as we always have. Maybe you could close your window when you're needing to concentrate. And just so you're aware, I can hear you and your colleagues when your window is open, I hope you're not saying anything confidential. I must get on, thanks for doing the bins while we were away" then shut the door.
"He's gone, I can hear him on his Very Important Meeting. I could join in, I can hear every word on both sides. I suspect he'll be back, probably when my husband is back from work so they can talk man to man.
"He's unsettled me though, he was so self-confident when he came to the door, so sure that he would get exactly what he wanted. How do you get that kind of confidence? I wish I had it. Or is it arrogance? He made me think I was in the wrong at first.
"We love our garden, we use it all the time. I'm not sure how we'll deal with this one, but I wasn't being unreasonable by refusing to bring the kids inside, was I? He's the one who has made the change, not us. I don't think working from home is new for him, he was just somewhere else in his house before I guess.
"Now he's on top of our patio with his big booming voice. I feel quite sad about it, if he's there all day every day it's going to be awful."
People defended the woman, saying she should never have been put in that position having to defend why her children were in the garden enjoying themselves.
One sympathised: "My husband has very important meetings. If it's noisy outside, he closes the window! Maybe you need to start quoting back to him some info from his calls..."
"Not your fault he made a poor location choice for his office. Crack on and ignore him", another suggested.
Someone else wrote: "Some people are just born with a different level of entitlement and lack of empathy for others. Enjoy your garden and don't be swayed! You've also done a great of role modeling polite but firm boundaries for the children so big thumbs up all round."
"Oh goodness I'd be inviting my children's friends round more often. Maybe set up a paddling pool or trampoline", one commented, followed by a smiling face.
Have you ever dealt with a neighbour situation like this? Let us know in the comments.
