Good Fences, Good Neighbors

I live in a small town where the old adage is often true – good fences make good neighbors. Unless it happens to be my neighbor and her fence.
The fence along the one side of our backyard had been leaning and threatening to fall down for as long as I’d lived in the house. Eight feet tall when it was first built, the cedar planks did their best to provide a division between our two yards, but lost height each summer when the grapevines would pull the fence closer to the ground. Now, we could almost see into her backyard and into her back windows if we stood on the highest level of the yard. We didn’t mind this when our next door neighbors were cute, young Ann and John and their adorable baby, Anders. But when they moved out and not so cute with no baby Leslie moved in, the heaving fence became a hard to tolerate eyesore as well as the accompanying view.
Leslie is a neighbor who is difficult to like. It isn’t that she does anything overt or deliberate to make you angry with her. She’s just the type of person who only talks to you when she needs something, or acts pathetically single and female just before a 20-inch snow storm. Once the tool is loaned or the driveway is plowed, she can barely exert enough effort to offer up a “hello”.
And then there is her awful boyfriend who insists on parking his car in front of our house instead of in their driveway. A nightly irritant for Fred who likes to feel free to water the front yard without worrying about water spots on the neighbor's Toyota.
Two years ago last spring, Leslie came to our front door to “talk about the fence”. She told us that this was the summer she was going to replace it and, if Fred wouldn’t mind, she was wondering if he could prop up the worst panels from our side so that she could bring over a variety of suppliers to show them what she had in mind. She promised the fence would be torn down and replaced within six weeks, but it would be so helpful if he could prop it for her. And did she mention she was having an engagement party for her and her boyfriend, and she’d really appreciate Fred’s help in making her yard look as presentable as possible. Fred reluctantly agreed but said, “Six weeks you say?” She replied quickly, “Absolutely! Not a day longer.”
So the fence was propped, and the engagement party was held, and summer, fall and winter all came and went. And Fred fumed.
The next spring, Leslie came to our door again, and told us that the fence would be torn down the next day, and if we had any plants that were particularly fragile, we may want to move them. And she also said that she was bringing in a surveyor the next week to make sure that the new fence was placed exactly on the official line between our two properties. “I just have a feeling my yard is a little bit bigger, and I want to make sure I get what is mine,” she said, smiling smugly.
Without thinking, I said, “Oh, okay, we’ll wait to hear from you.” And Fred, who heard the whole exchange from the next room, fumed.
The next day, the fence was torn down in a matter of minutes, which made us realize exactly how ready that fence was to fall. And when the surveyor came in the following week, he took copious measurements and notes and prepared what I presumed was a detailed report. And another week went by, and then another, and finally, on a Saturday when we were both out working in our yards, I asked Leslie, “So how did the surveying come out?” She fidgeted with her rake and paused a full minute before answering. “Well, it turns out that the fence was a put up wrong all those years ago. My fence was three feet into your yard.” I looked at her, expecting her to say she was kidding, but she didn’t. I waited for her to continue, but when she didn’t, I said, “So what does that mean?”
“It means,” she said angrily, “that you gain three feet of yard, and I lose it!” She jabbed her rake at her garden and went on. “I hadn’t planned on this, and am not really too motivated to rebuild a fence around a tiny yard that was horrible to start with. I just don’t know what I’m going to do unless…”
“Unless what?” I asked.
“Unless you let me build the fence right where it was. It will be just like it was before, except new,” she replied brightly.
“Hmmm…I don’t think I can do that, Leslie. It might compromise the resale of our house,” I answered her calmly.
“Well, I just don’t what I’m going to do then. We may just have to go without a fence,” she said, her voice quivering.
“Whatever,” I replied. “Just keep us posted.” And we spent the next two weeks doing what we do in our back yard with Leslie and her boyfriend, now fiancé, watching our every move.
And the fence went up, about three weeks later, exactly three feet over into her yard from where it had spent the previous 25 years.
I live in a small town.