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#Post#: 71501--------------------------------------------------
Neighbors helping without asking
By: betty Date: November 8, 2021, 1:14 pm
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I just heard a noise outside and realized my neighbors were
raking up leaves (and mowing the rest) in my front yard. The
leaves are mostly from trees on their property, but I fully
expected to rake and mow again at some point. We just hadn't
gotten to it yet. The front yard isn't huge but isn't tiny,
probably takes an hour to clear.
I went out to say, "Hi! That's not necessary!" My neighbor said
she feels bad because the leaves are from her trees. I thanked
her and reiterated that we are fine raking and we enjoy the
shade from her trees. Eventually, I went back in because I had a
business call.
We're casually friendly with the neighbors. We say hello and
I've invited them when we were having a backyard barbecue (but
they didn't come over). We are middle-aged but not elderly or
frail.
FWIW, I sometimes shovel snow from her sidewalk in the winter.
The neighbor has a corner house so they have twice the sidewalk
to shovel. I'll sometimes do the part adjacent to my house. We
sometimes shovel for other neighbors and the other neighbors in
the block sometimes shovel for us.
What do you all think? Is doing this kind of yard work without
asking a nice gesture or a breach of neighborly etiquette?
#Post#: 71502--------------------------------------------------
Re: Neighbors helping without asking
By: BeagleMommy Date: November 8, 2021, 1:22 pm
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I always think it is better to ask before doing any type of yard
work for someone else.
While raking the leaves might be okay, mowing someone else's
lawn is a bit too much. Maybe you don't like to cut yours as
low as they do.
#Post#: 71505--------------------------------------------------
Re: Neighbors helping without asking
By: holly firestorm Date: November 8, 2021, 1:35 pm
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It was meant as a nice gesture. You said yourself you sometimes
shovel snow in front of her house, right? So, she's just taking
a cue from you. If you feel it's not appropriate, telling her
was the right thing to do. I hope you weren't too annoyed about
it, because that always can be heard in our voices.
You're lucky to have such thoughtful neighbors, even if boundary
issues needed to be clarified.
#Post#: 71509--------------------------------------------------
Re: Neighbors helping without asking
By: oogyda Date: November 8, 2021, 1:58 pm
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[quote author=holly firestorm link=topic=2200.msg71505#msg71505
date=1636400107]
It was meant as a nice gesture. You said yourself you sometimes
shovel snow in front of her house, right? So, she's just taking
a cue from you. If you feel it's not appropriate, telling her
was the right thing to do. I hope you weren't too annoyed about
it, because that always can be heard in our voices.
You're lucky to have such thoughtful neighbors, even if boundary
issues needed to be clarified.
[/quote]
I couldn't say it better.
It sounds like you have a lovely neighborhood.
#Post#: 71515--------------------------------------------------
Re: Neighbors helping without asking
By: betty Date: November 8, 2021, 5:09 pm
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[quote]
It sounds like you have a lovely neighborhood.
[/quote]
We do, thank you, and we're happy to be friendly with the
neighbors.
We are just feeling awkward about this, especially since we
couldn't jump up and help. It seems like there is a big
difference between raking and mowing our front yard versus
occasionally shoveling the public sidewalk (which usually
doesn't take very long and doesn't involve going onto their
property).
#Post#: 71522--------------------------------------------------
Re: Neighbors helping without asking
By: AnnNottingham Date: November 8, 2021, 9:02 pm
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I grew up on a very short street, and after a snow my dad would
go around the entire street with our snowblower. He did the
sidewalks and all the driveways, especially those of elderly
people, so that cars could get out. Everyone was thankful. It
was mostly down by the street, not on property.
I think if someone had let it be known they were uncomfortable
with that, he would have stopped, of course.
Somehow, that
#Post#: 71523--------------------------------------------------
Re: Neighbors helping without asking
By: pierrotlunaire0 Date: November 8, 2021, 9:11 pm
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I have a neighbor who occasionally mows the easement in front of
my house. I pay someone to regularly mow my lawn, and I have
spoken to the neighbor on occasion. She mows her own yard and
another neighbor's, and according to her, she does it for the
exercise.
I have thanked her, although I wonder if I should do something
in return (Christmas cookies?).
It's not quite the same because she only does a little of my
property. It doesn't bother me at all, though.
#Post#: 71537--------------------------------------------------
Re: Neighbors helping without asking
By: Hmmm Date: November 9, 2021, 10:18 am
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[quote author=betty link=topic=2200.msg71515#msg71515
date=1636412965]
[quote]
It sounds like you have a lovely neighborhood.
[/quote]
We do, thank you, and we're happy to be friendly with the
neighbors.
We are just feeling awkward about this, especially since we
couldn't jump up and help. It seems like there is a big
difference between raking and mowing our front yard versus
occasionally shoveling the public sidewalk (which usually
doesn't take very long and doesn't involve going onto their
property).
[/quote]
While it never hurts to ask first before coming onto other's
property, to me this would be a nice surprise type thing.
Because if they asked first, I'd feel I had to say no thank you.
But then I'd start to wonder if my leaves were blowing back
into their yard and I'd feel the need to immediately go out and
start cleaning up.
While technically the sidewalk in front of their property is not
theirs, I'm sure they feel like it is theirs to maintain. So
shoveling their sidewalk to me is in the same category as raking
leaves. Especially since the leaves in your yard are from their
trees. I'd could see being the neighbor and seeing all my leaves
in your yard and feeling like "oh shoot, I should clean those up
too since I already have the rake and other stuff out."
#Post#: 71542--------------------------------------------------
Re: Neighbors helping without asking
By: TootsNYC Date: November 9, 2021, 11:50 am
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[quote]While technically the sidewalk in front of their property
is not theirs, I'm sure they feel like it is theirs to maintain.
[/quote]
It probably is their to maintain, legally.
I wouldn't suggest one feel too bad about the raking of the
leaves. I think someone would totally be willing to do this, and
might find it pleasing in some way. More exercise, more time
outside, satisfies their wish to have things tidy, etc.
It may well be that "they're our tree's leaves" is more of an
excuse than a reason.
I think as long as you're a helpful neighbor at other times,
it's perfectly okay to simply accept the generosity.
I agree with the comment about mowing--that's something I'd want
to discuss, because of grass height, etc. But raking doesn't
seem that way to me.
I know there are movements to have people leave their leaf
litter for the bugs, but I don't think that's something the
neighbor could be expected to know, and if it were the case,
there isn't that much damage done; more leaves will probably
fall, and you can go tell your neighbor that you want to leave
them for the bugs.
#Post#: 71543--------------------------------------------------
Re: Neighbors helping without asking
By: jpcher Date: November 9, 2021, 1:41 pm
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[quote author=guihong link=topic=2200.msg71522#msg71522
date=1636426940]
I grew up on a very short street, and after a snow my dad would
go around the entire street with our snowblower. He did the
sidewalks and all the driveways, especially those of elderly
people, so that cars could get out. Everyone was thankful. It
was mostly down by the street, not on property.
I think if someone had let it be known they were uncomfortable
with that, he would have stopped, of course.
Somehow, that
[/quote]
What a nice man your father was! I would have thanked him with
cookies, hot chocolate, or some such thing. I wouldn't have been
uncomfortable at all!
Side track -- My brother did that one year. It was The Snow of
'79 (Chicago area, huge snowfall). He took our riding mower that
had a snow plow attachment on it and went to all the houses on
our block (plowing the sidewalk as he went) and plowed out all
of their driveways.
Nice guy! Right? NOT! He neglected to plow our driveway first .
. . before he ran out of gas. Guess who had to go out and help
shovel before our father came home. :o ::)
Back on track --
[quote author=betty link=topic=2200.msg71501#msg71501
date=1636398861]
What do you all think? Is doing this kind of yard work without
asking a nice gesture or a breach of neighborly etiquette?
[/quote]
I think it's a nice gesture. Neighbors taking care of neighbors.
However, if you feel strongly about missing the opportunity to
rake the leaves yourself then I think you should say something.
Maybe bring them a plate of cookies (or whatever) to open the
conversation.
"Thank you so much for doing all of that work, but it wasn't
necessary. We love that tree and so, very much, appreciate the
shade it gives us in the summer and actually enjoy cleaning up
after it."
You could go on to say (during conversation) something like
(from my own personal experience) "My daughters and I look
forward to the fun of raking leaves every year. Maybe next year
we can plan on all of us doing it together? Your yard and ours?"
Like I said, it depends on how strongly you, betty, feels about
the situation.
Do you want them to hard-stop? Then my answer would be
different.
Would you like to form a good-neighbor relationship with them?
Then my answer stands.
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