ADRENALINE

Whoa.  This Board position is way more work than I anticipated.  I’m getting my assertive on!

a·dren·al·ine

noun

a hormone secreted by the adrenal glands, especially in conditions of stress, increasing rates of blood circulation, breathing, and carbohydrate metabolism and preparing muscles for exertion.

One lady has been removing shrubs around her condo for the past two years.  The first time happened late at night and she was just SHOCKED!  How could someone come so near her condo and do such a thing!  The second time it happened (during the daylight hours) people saw her.  With the help of some stronger neighbors to help remove the evidence.  The third time she blamed the landscape company.  No one has asked her to rectify!  

This time the past prez (and still on the Board) was ANGRY in front of her and she said "oh dear, maybe you better smack my hands" …. and laughed.  She even removed some plants from in front of her next door neighbor’s!  She asks her male neighbor to help her dispose of branches and dig out roots!  What is with these people?  

Rather than send her a written reprimand with a huge fine from the Property Management Company, I went over to talk to her.  First she lied.  Then she laughed!!  Then she said “I’m just following suit” and “others have told me this was fine”.  I kept my cool (although I did ask her if others jumped off the Golden Gate Bridge, would she?)(and that I know she can read and that she has our bylaws and house rules that specifically outline how you can get your landscape changed), and kept repeating that I want IN WRITING how she plans to rectify things.  She kept interrupting with but this and but that and I would simply repeat my mantra "I would like, in writing, how you plan to rectify this"  She asks "rectify everything"  Well, yes, everything that you have damaged over the past two years.  And don't tell me the man in the moon came one night and took three five foot rhododendrens.

A nosy neighbor (who probably told her it was okay)(she's the biggest condo gossip and Queen of misinformation)(and has BEEN on the Board and the Landscape Committee so she knows it is NOT OKAY) came up on her patio to interrupt our conversation and I asked her to please come back in ten minutes.  She continued to blather and I raised my voice and said SYLVIA, please leave as this is a private conversation that does not concern you.

My heart was racing by the time I returned home.  The past prez came over to be sure I was okay and asked how the whole thing played out.  So the adrenaline kept pumping.

Next up, a relative of my wonderful next door neighbor (she who shares her awesome Persian cooking) ALWAYS parks his huge Mercedes in the red curb fire lane rather than an uncovered parking spot.  I was needing to back out (and I really could have done it without moving his car but I wanted to prove a point) to take Jesse to his garden and the boys to the library.  The first time I asked, he was sitting on her sofa (I was looking in the screen door) ... and he snorted!  I had to repeat myself and add that it needed to happen NOW so I could get my car out.  She was wringing her hands and muttering and not knowing what to do ... Iranian men do not like ladies suggesting they do things ... and she does not want her neighbors to be upset.  He finally moved it.

It seems to me that when someone is in a situation where they know they are in the wrong, it brings out the bad in bad people ... and the good in good people.