neighborinos

Cardinal Ridge's days as our own private paradise appear to be numbered. When we bought the place off the Douglas boys back in December, we only got 2 out of the 4 parcels that comprised their family land. It actually wasn't a real tough decision, we got the house and the parcel behind it that had a peach orchard and cabin on it. Parcel 3 is down a ravine and across a creek from our house and the land was really steep without much potential to farm or develop otherwise. Parcel 4 is the very back end of our land and while it would be nice to have, it is also steep & hilly lacking the potential to contribute much to our farm besides higher property taxes.

If those sound like the justifications of a man who would like to have bought all that land but couldn't afford it, they are. One of the best things about our place is the privacy. If someone comes up the drive, we know about it long before they get anywhere near the house thanks to our dog brigade and we also figure they must have some business with us or they wouldn't have driven a quarter mile up a gravel road. So if I wanted to say, water the raised beds and let the chickens out in my skivvies there isn't much risk of offending the neighbors. But my summer of skivvies looks to have come to an abrupt end when a strange truck rolled up the drive a couple weeks ago. It was one of the Douglas boys on a trip down from New York City, come to let us know they would be selling off the other two parcels. We danced around the issue, making small talk about growing apples & peaches until Douglas dropped the bomb. He and his brothers wanted to sell the other parcels and if we were interested we all might be able to reach a mutually satisfying arrangement. I'm not really one to make major decisions after a few beers on a Thursday night, so we took down his info and promised to get back to him. As he left, he mentioned the land would be listed within the month.

We spent the weekend racking our brains trying to come up with a plan. Leading contenders to come up with some cash included selling off some timber on our land, e-baying my baseball card collection & claiming our jams are "medicinal" so we charge by the .oz instead of the half pint. None of those ideas looked likely to put enough pesos in our pockets to purchase either parcel. As the weekend wore on, it began to dawn on us that with our mortgage it jut wasn't a bright idea to stretch ourselves thin on more land we couldn't afford. So, I wrote an email to Douglas explaining our situation and resolved to forget about expanding our empire at the present time.

Well, it wasn't long before new strange cars began creeping up the driveway. All visitors (and some imaginary ones) are greeted by powerful bass heavy woofs from Otto and a strange desperate yodeling from Clyde. Unfortunately that doesn't seem to deter real estate agents nor the folks who want to know just where that parcel for sale is. One station wagon emblazoned with soccer ball stickers arrived in between thunderstorms last Saturday, the captain of the Subaru whipped out a satellite view of the parcel for sale and exclaimed, "Oh, this must be the house on my map!" Too bad our house was nowhere near the parcel he wanted to explore with the wife and kids, but that didn't stop the captain for asking me for a 3 hour tour. I politely declined and roughly gestured in the direction he needed to head before heading inside to dash off an email to the real estate agent re: better signage indicating the position of Parcel 3. One of the reasons we ended up so far out in B.F.E was my dislike of people in general; but when complete strangers start dropping in for advice on how to become our neighborinos...Let's just say Jonny gets a little miffed. I start saying crazy things like how the right of way to parcel 3 is overgrown and impassable, how the bridge across the creek has collapsed and the land itself is steeper than a church steeple and quite possibly a former Indian burial ground. I don't know where these bad thoughts come from, it's almost like I was possessed by the ghost of a Cherokee warrior or something. After the tour groups got done trampling over our privacy, April and I convened a council on how best to deter future settlers. My favorite ideas included letting off shots Yosemite Sam style anytime we hear cars coming, getting some of those fake buckteeth and wearing holey overalls 24-7 or just becoming Caldwell County's first nudist farmers. If necessary I am willing to take it whatever the level after naked weeding is...