<p>Not reciprocating “niceness” is not the same thing as being critical. Living in an apartment building is a real lesson in human nature. Without fail, the chattiest, friendliest people in the elevator are the ones who are nightmares for their immediate neighbors. My H and I have had an ongoing disagreement about people in our building – he tends to think that the most demonstratively nice types are better people than the ones who are not. I say those are the ones that are secretly the most intolerant! And I’m only half kidding. But I’ve been 100% right so far.</p>
<p>mousegray, have you ever seen Woody Allen’s* Manhattan Murder Mystery*? Friendly elevator neighbors sure turned out to be not so nice in that one.</p>
<p>^^No, I’ll have to see that one. </p>
<p>Just want to add that we are lucky to have wonderful, considerate neighbors ourselves. In the only house that we’ve ever lived in, we had a nasty neighbor but he died. Problem solved.</p>
<p>^^^^You should see it. Really funny, and of course, lots of pretty scenes of Manhattan.</p>
<p>One of my closest and dearest friends has a daughter the same age as my younger daughter. Her D is extremely bright and gregarious, but is hindered physically by severe cerebral palsy. I have been humbled time and again at my friend’s generosity and true happiness for my D’s successes. Her D is a wonderful young woman, but she is not traveling all over the place and doing new things. The only time my friend gets annoyed with me is when she thinks I haven’t told her about something my D is doing. </p>
<p>I have been a friend to her and her daughter as well. I provide a lot of comic relief, but I often wonder could I be as devoid of jealousy if my daughter was the one at home, and my friend’s D was traveling. I don’t know, but I cherish my friend’s grace and her example. </p>
<p>Gmom, I think your idea of flowers is lovely. I think from your posts in other threads that doing something nice spontaneously is in character for you, so why not? You just never know, maybe by just acknowledging that this is a nuisance for them will be all it takes.</p>
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<p>We had an experience with a neighbor that has some overlap to this. I received a phone call about 25 years ago from my neighbor and I have never forgotten it. We moved in several months earlier and we had never met. Instead of saying hello and introducing herself and welcoming us, she called to complain and came across as fairly angry. The complaint was that a piece of the fence in our backyard fell over and her sons “had to put it back”. I never noticed that it fell, and I never noticed that her sons put it back properly. She went on to complain that her boys did not have time for this type of thing. I have never had a friendly exchange with them ever since, other than a wave and a quick hello. Nobody requested that her family touch our fence. It was just so odd.</p>
<p>“I feel disappointed in much of my fellow humans. I try to do all of the above, and I find that very very very few give me the same courtesy.”</p>
<p>I know what you are saying, but I can’t help but point out (and apologies if its been done already on this thread, I’ve not yet read it all)…but aren’t you being critical here?</p>