I Got A Cream For That
My next-door neighbor is a middle-aged woman who lives with her elderly mom. Not because her mom needs to be taken care of—I believe it’s the other way around. She doesn’t work and is basically a little girl in a 50-year-old body. I work from home, and this woman is home all day, doing who knows what.
Whenever I go outside, she magically appears and gives me her “expert” advice on whatever I’m doing. If I engage in a conversation with her (just to be nice), it’ll eat up 20 to 30 minutes of my time. It’s one of those inescapable conversations.
And if I do anything, and I mean ANYTHING, like bite my fingernail out of nervousness because I don’t know when I’ll be able to exit this conversation, she’ll go: “STOP! Wait, I got a cream for that!”
Or if I shoo away a fly, she’ll go: “WAIT! I got the BEST bug spray! Top of the line!” Everything she has is “top of the line” or “the most expensive, highest quality out there,” and she’s got something for everything! I literally can’t MOVE around her, because she’s got something for everything I’m doing!
One time she caught me painting a statue in my garden. She came over with boxes and boxes of paint. And once she starts up with a new topic, tack on another 20 minutes of time And that’s just my experience with her while I’m outside. Behind closed doors, it’s a total nightmare.
Before I knew any of this about her, I made the mistake of inviting her into my house for a cup of coffee. No wait, let me correct that. She actually saw me drinking coffee on my front porch one day and asked if she could have one. While I found that a bit intrusive, I felt rude saying no, so I made her one.
And while I was making the coffee in my kitchen, she continued talking to me from my front porch, and I couldn’t really hear what she was saying. I felt rude, so I invited her into the foyer rather than have her stand outside. MISTAKE. Now she comes over twice, sometimes three times a week for coffee!
And whenever she sees me outside, she asks, “can I have a coffee?” And when she rings my doorbell and I answer the door to greet her, she’s already stepping into my house, like a vampire that I can’t stop from coming inside because I’ve already made the mistake of inviting her in once!
And each time she comes over, I face new horrors. She’s getting more and more comfortable in my house, sitting on my couch (She reeks of smoke. I don’t smoke, and prefer to have my house not smelling like that).
And now she’s asking to borrow things, browsing the shelves in my living room, and then exclaiming, “Oh! My mom would love to read this! You’re not reading it right now, right? I’ll bring it back, you know where I live anyway”.
And then she helps herself to an item on the shelf. I don’t like being mean to people, but I feel like the only way to stop her is to be That Person. I’m a single, 30-year-old woman, living alone. I think I’m way too nice, to the point where I let things go beyond what I’m comfortable with.
This was my mistake, I know. But how do I undo all of this in the nicest way possible? If I had it my way, I would have it so that she never comes back into my house ever again.
She is my neighbor, not my friend. She is not my type of person. We have nothing in common. I just want to be left alone. Story credit: Reddit / (Katherine_1990)