Dear Upstairs Neighbors,

James L. T.
Sep 8, 2018 · 3 min read

You’re the worst.

I’m a fairly patient person, it’s a quality I’m pretty well known to possess. I’m also a very quiet person, which will be the one quality that people well talk about once I’m dead: “He was so quiet, I didn’t even know he was alive to begin with,” they’ll say. Generally speaking, I’m a polite person. After all, I let people merge into traffic, I smile at everyone, hold doors open (for everyone) while questioning the patriarchal underpinnings of my social etiquette. By this last measure, I should be going to the “Good Place.” I’m also not a very combative, competitive, or confrontational person, even though I write about politics almost always, have very strong core beliefs, and sometimes feel confident in a way that may be perceived as narcissistic when I’ve done something I finally feel proud of.

And yet — you’re challenging all of these qualities that I know I possess. How, you might ask? For starters, you don’t pick up your furry minions’ shits. Literally, you just let your dog dump where it wants, which would be great if it wasn’t for the fact that six tenants share the same small 10’ x 10’ patch of grass. There’s no reason why every morning I should see more dog shit than grass and dirt. How do I know it’s your fault? Because I’ve observed seven people picking up their dog’s turds — but not you — you gawk at its droppings and march on.

Secondly, how is it that you make so much noise — throughout the whole night? Are you welding? Are you creating a hadron collider in your 650 square foot apartment? How it is that you manage to make it indistinguishable between your thumping around, someone knocking on the door, or a complete and utter violent break in is baffling, to say the least. The worst part, is that I know you all can walk quietly, so when all of a sudden it sounds like an invasion of orcs I begin to wonder if you’re doing it on purpose. I’ve started to repeat “fe, fi, fo, fum” whenever you begin stomping around — it’s not cute.

You know what is cute? When the other upstairs neighbor gets home. I know that she’s home because her 120 pound dog begins to run around the apartment, bouncing off of the furniture. The walls. Likely the ceiling. Who could get mad at such furry innocence? I can’t.

But you — you epitomize the qualities of the worst kind of neighbor. You’re loud, you’re not courteous, and you apparently make no effort to be quiet.

I try to be patient, but when it’s three o’clock in the morning and the knocking around is so loud that even my cats become frightened, I can’t help but see a depletion of my patience. Because I am not confrontational, I won’t say any of this to your faces even though you deserve it, and because I am not combative I’ll likely just have this posted to my personal blog where you’ll never know that you’ve been trash talked.

    James L. T.

    Written by

    Mental health counselor by day, political blogger by night. #cat person, #liberal. Twitter: @AntiphonSophist

    Welcome to a place where words matter. On Medium, smart voices and original ideas take center stage - with no ads in sight. Watch
    Follow all the topics you care about, and we’ll deliver the best stories for you to your homepage and inbox. Explore
    Get unlimited access to the best stories on Medium — and support writers while you’re at it. Just $5/month. Upgrade