You heard right, folks. Our porch and backyard were vandalized Friday night/Saturday morning. My brand new beautiful backyard was trashed, and worst of all, we think the neighbor's kid did it.
We woke up Saturday morning with the intentions of raking the yard and cleaning house. Z went out the back door onto the porch, then immediately called for me to come outside also. I got my robe on and went outside in the freezing cold. I couldn't believe my eyes. Everything from our porch – a chair, bench, wooden porch swing, long rug we'd used for moving, cooler/radio, step ladder, and a ton of other stuff I can't think of right now – had been tossed off the porch, knocked over, scattered all across the backyard. Our large gas grill had been dragged into the side yard then knocked upside down with the propane tank ripped off. Two rakes and a box full of grill tools (spatulas, etc) were gone (although we didn't realize this at the time). We checked our cars, which up until this weekend we'd been leaving unlocked at the house. They were fine and everything was still in them.
I was in shock, but then I got really mad. We haven't been rude to anyone, we haven't left trash sitting out, we don't have any animals that bother the neighbors, we don't play loud music. I just didn't get it. I went inside to take a shower while Z called the police. It's a really small city, so before I was even out of the shower and dressed, the policeman had come and gone. He thought the same thing Z and I thought: since nothing large was stolen (like the brand new step ladder) it was probably just neighborhood kids acting stupid.
Well that's not good enough for me. Z and I were raised to be responsible for our actions, and either one of us would have been punished for doing something like that to a neighbor's yard. So we decided we would go around to the neighbors' houses and introduce ourselves, explain what happened, and ask if they saw or heard anything last night. As soon as the police officer mentioned neighborhood kids, though, I had a really sad thought – our neighborhood is mostly full of retired people. The only "kids" that aren't small children live directly behind us. It's a family renting the home, and we didn't know anything about them. Any time we'd seen them, they didn't really seem interested in speaking to us or welcoming us to the neighborhood. They wouldn't even return my wave when I passed them in my car. But I'd seen them often, and knew there was a mom, dad, a boy who looked about 3, a boy who looked about 12, and another who was possibly 18. (I don't know who exactly the smallest child belongs to. He might be a grandson.) Anyway, we'd never met any of them, and we thought maybe we should pay them a visit.
Meanwhile, the whole time we'd been walking around in the yard, getting upset, showing the police officer everything, and cleaning up the yard, the middle kid from next door was in his yard half-way watching us. He took turns shooting hoops and lounging on top of his father's pickup truck. (Keep in mind it was about 45 degrees that morning.) We thought we'd gotten everything picked up, and then I noticed that our two rakes, which had been leaning against one of our trees, were missing. Since nothing else seemed to be missing, I assumed they'd been carried off somewhere, possibly tossed into the lake. Considering we just bought a nice rake, that made me pretty mad. Then something caught my eye. Our box full of grill tools was on the other side of the fence – the neighbors' side. That was it. I yelled to Z what I'd found. We weren't going to just walk into their yard to get it, because we didn't know these people and didn't want to assume they would be reasonable. A few minutes later Z notices the two rakes flat in their tall grass, almost totally hidden. I was completely pissed. The kid was back inside by this point, and we head over to ring the doorbell and talk to his parents.
He meets us at the front door with a grunt. This kid is dressed like a thug and speaks like one too. His whole demeanor said What do you want? You're not coming in my house. Z asked if his dad was at home. We got a "Naw" in return. We glanced at both vehicles sitting in the driveway and said that we just wanted to introduce ourselves, but we'd come back later.
We sat down on our back porch, which faces the side of their house and yard. There was no way we were going to let him take our things and hide them before we got the chance to talk to his parents. The boy came back outside on his cell phone and walked up and down his driveway, which runs down the side of our house and yard, saying very loudly into his phone that his parents were gone until Tuesday and he had to go to basketball practice in a little while. I highly doubt he was actually on the phone with anybody. I think he was just trying to let us know that we should just give up and leave him alone. It was freezing outside, so after about 20 minutes we went in to eat some lunch, but we stayed at the windows and never took our eyes off our stuff in his yard. The boy started playing basketball, and our things were in plain view of him. I know he could see them, but he couldn't move them because he could see us watching. The whole thing was so silly, but we didn't want to talk to him without his parents and have him simply claim he didn't know anything.
After lunch, there were still no adults around, so Z finally decided that he wanted to rake the yard, dammit, so he went marching over to talk to the kid. He immediately saw Z and met him at the fence (I'm telling you, he was acting very defensive). Z asked again if his parents were home, and when the kid said no, Z told him the mess we'd found that morning. Then he asked why our stuff was in their yard. The kid didn't even try to look surprised, he just said he didn't know and walked over to pick up the two rakes and the box, then he handed them over the fence to Z.
Then he launched into an elaborate story about how that had happened to their yard a while back, and he thought it was a man "up the road near the car wash" that didn't like him. Then he said that same man had broken his dad's truck window with a rock and blamed it on the kid. Then he changed his story and said he thought it was a kid down the road. He said he wouldn't have that kid over to play anymore and he was also going to "tell his mom." Give me a break.
So we figure, OK, he's a liar, but he seems sort of harmless, and at least none of our stuff was broken. We'll just talk to his parents when they get home. We start raking the yard and a different neighbor walks over to meet us and chat. He's the husband of a nice lady who had also already come over to greet me a few weeks ago while I was painting one night. He and Z started talking about what happened, and he seemed pretty surprised. He admitted that the kid had some problems (we learned he goes to an alternative school, does badly in school, and his family moved from Montgomery because he was getting into too much trouble), but he had never done anything like that before.
Right about then, the boy's parents both walk out of the house, get in their two vehicles, and drive away. The little kid (Mike) was in the truck with his dad. Z and I, along with the nice neighbor (Harold) all waved at them as they drove by. None of them even looked at us. So of course, Z and I look at each other and say, "I thought his parents were gone until Tuesday." So that confirms that he's a liar, whether he's the one who trashed our porch and yard or not. And he clearly has something to hide. So Z says, "Well, I guess his dad's taking him to basketball practice. When they come back, I'll just go over and introduce myself and explain what happened." The neighbor told us the dad's a night manager at Wal-Mart and the mother is the manager of Dollar General. The pieces were coming together for me. He has parents who work full time at strange hours, a cute 3-year-old in the house, and he has school troubles. Sounds like he's starving for attention to me.
The dad returned about 30 minutes later, and Z put down the rake to go speak to him. He practically ran into his house when he noticed Z walking toward their yard. Then he got back in his truck and drove off a few moments later. What the crap? So we still haven't spoken to his parents…
That afternoon we went into the city to buy blinds/curtains for our back door and kitchen door. We were going to do that eventually anyway, but by that point we felt like it was imperative. The whole ordeal makes me think the fence we thought we couldn't afford is higher on the priority list now, as well as the security system we were putting off. And instead of getting a cute puppy, maybe we should just get a man eating dog…
Sunday afternoon, after church (and my baptism – another post for another day), we watched Mike as he used loppers about as big as himself to chop down all the muscadine vines on his fence (they're renters, remember?), then turned the loppers onto the lower branches of a couple of fruit trees. When he couldn't reach anymore, he got a step ladder and started chopping down larger branches high over his head. He looked like an accident waiting to happen. About 2 hours went by with no adult checking on him, and he nearly cut down the whole tree. Then he proceeded to drag all the limbs and clippings and heave them over the fence. Then he glanced up at our windows and walked away. Their fence is crooked though, and it's not truly an indicator of their property line. So, he didn't really drop them on our property, but he clearly meant to. Uh, are we living by Damien?
Harold told us something else that bothered me. He said that Mike occasionally comes over to their house to ask to use things. Don't get me wrong – I'm neighborly, and I'll give a cup of sugar, but that's not what I'm talking about. He said that Mike would come over in the middle of the night (where were his parents?) to ask to use the phone, saying their house phone was cut off. (Remember, I said he was using a cell phone this weekend. So… why would he need the neighbors' phone? And who does he need to call in the middle of the night anyway?) Harold also told us that he didn't know anything about the dad's truck window being broken out. (Do you know any retired men who are still young enough to be in their yards often? If so, then you know that they know everything about their neighbors. They see and know all. I believe if the truck window had really been broken out, Harold would have known about it.) He also said Mike sometimes comes over and asks for gasoline for their weed eater. That's an expensive favor, and what kind of able-bodied man would have his maybe-12-year-old son bothering the neighbors about gasoline for the weed eater? We're in town. Gas is walking distance away. (For that matter, they have two nice vehicles. We're not talking about a poor boy who has no parents.) I am generally a positive person, but it seems to me that if you've got a troubled kid coming over to your house at all times, he might be checking out what's inside of it. Or trying to learn when you're home and when you're not (or maybe just when the man isn't home). Or who knows what. After talking to this kid, he truly doesn't seem like he can be trusted. It honestly gives me hesitations about getting a puppy or kitten. If he can come onto our porch in the middle of the night and steal and ransack, is he violent? I have no idea. After watching how destructive he was Sunday afternoon, I truly dread Christmas break when he's at home, bored, all day. Heaven help us. And the remaining fruit trees.
