“Smoke Signals: My Neighbor’s War on My Laundry”
My Neighbor Started a Barbecue Every Time I Hung Laundry Outside Just to Ruin It
My washing ritual was sacrosanct for thirty-five years until my new neighbor, equipped with a grill and a grudge, began to fire it up as soon as my immaculate sheets touched the clothesline. At first, it seemed trivial. Then it became intimate. However, I ultimately had the final laugh.
Some people use weather or holidays to indicate the seasons. I identify mine by the type of sheet that’s on the line: cotton in the summer, flannel in the winter, and those lavender-scented linens that my late husband Tom loved in the spring. Certain traditions become your pillars after 35 years in the same small two-bedroom Pine Street home, particularly when life has taken away so many others.
One Tuesday morning, I heard the familiar scrape of metal on the concrete next door while I was pinning up the last of my white sheets.
“Not again,” I whispered, my lips still gripped over the clothespins.
I spotted Melissa, my neighbor of precisely six months, at that moment. She was hauling her enormous barbecue grill made of stainless steel over to the fence line. She looked aside after our brief eye contact, a smile teasing the corners of her mouth.
She exclaimed, “Morning, Diane!” with a fake smile. “Beautiful day for a cookout, isn’t it?”
I took my mouth’s pins out. “At ten in the morning on a Tuesday?”
Her blond highlights caught the sunlight as she shrugged. “I’m preparing my meals. You are aware of how hectic things are.
After Melissa’s smoky supper prep sessions, I had to rewash a whole load that came out smelling like lighter fluid and burnt bacon.
I’d had enough and had marched across the lawn when she repeated the same thing on Friday while I was hanging clothes on the line.
“Every time I do laundry, Melissa, are you lighting God knows what and cooking bacon? It smells like a diner married to a campfire throughout my entire house.
She chirped, “I’m just enjoying my yard,” and gave me her phony, syrupy smile. Neighbors are supposed to do that, right?
The smell of my lavender detergent blended with the sharp odor of charred steak and bacon as thick plumes of smoke drifted straight onto my immaculate linens in a matter of minutes.
It wasn’t cooking. This was combat.
“Everything okay, hon?” My old neighbor across the street, Eleanor, called from her garden.
I made an effort to grin. Simply delightful. There is nothing more ‘welcome to the neighborhood’ than laundry smelling of smoke.
Putting down her trowel, Eleanor approached. “That’s the third time this week she’s fired up that thing the minute your laundry goes out.”
I said, “Fourth,” instead. “You missed Monday’s impromptu hot dog extravaganza.”
“Have you tried talking to her?”
As I nodded, I noticed that my sheets were starting to become gray. “Twice. She merely declares that she is “enjoying her property rights” while grinning.
Eleanor squinted her eyes. “Well, Tom wouldn’t have stood for this nonsense.”
Even after eight years, I still felt a brief tenseness in my chest whenever my husband’s name was mentioned. “He wouldn’t have, no. However, Tom was also a proponent of picking your battles.
“And is this one worth picking?”
Melissa had a grill big enough to cook for twenty people, and I watched her turn a hamburger patty. “I’m starting to think it might be.”
With tears of frustration in my eyes, I removed my bedding that were now tinged with smoke. Before his diagnosis, they were the final pair that Tom and I had purchased together. They now smelled of pettiness and cheap charcoal.
I said to myself, “This isn’t over,” as I dragged my destroyed laundry back inside. “Not by a long shot.”
Sarah, my daughter, said, “Maybe it’s time to just get a dryer, Mom.” “They’re more efficient now, and—”
“Sweetheart, I’ve had a perfectly nice clothesline for thirty years. And I’m not going to be chased away by some Martha Stewart imitator who has boundary problems.”
Sarah let out a sigh. “I recognize that tone. What plans do you have?
“Are you planning? Me? I took out the guidebook for the neighborhood organization from my kitchen drawer. “Just exploring my options.”
“Mom? Rats are what I smell. large ones.”
“Did you realize that our HOA’s rules do have regulations about grill smoke? It seems that if it “unduly impacts neighboring properties,” it constitutes a “nuisance.”
“All right? Will you file a report against her?
I shut the manual. “Not just yet. I believe we should try something different initially.
“We? Sarah chuckled, “Oh no, don’t involve me in your neighbor’s quarrel.”
“It is too late! You used those pink and neon beach towels at that swim camp last summer, and I need to borrow them. as well as any more colorful laundry you may have on hand.
“You’re going to fight barbecue with laundry?”
“Let’s just say I’m going to give her Instagram brunch a new backdrop.”
With iced tea in hand, I sat on my back porch and observed Melissa’s backyard transformation. Along her fence, Edison bulb strings emerged. A brand-new pergola appeared. Her spotless paver patio was adorned with potted plants with flowers that matched in color.
Like clockwork, the same group of women arrived on Saturday mornings with bottles of champagne and fancy bags.
Gathering around her big farmhouse table, they would take pictures of avocado toast and one another while giggling like hyenas and gossiping about everyone else who wasn’t around, particularly the people they had hugged five minutes before.
I was able to get Melissa’s exact thoughts about me and my clothesline by listening in on enough of their chats.
She once told a friend, without even lowering her voice, “It’s like living next to a laundromat.” “Very cheesy. There were supposed to be standards in this area.
I snapped out of my reverie and hurried inside to collect the colorful towels and the hot pink robe my mom had given me for Christmas, which had the words “Hot Mama” on the back.
“Mom, what are you doing?” Emily, my youngest, let out a gasp. “You said you’d never wear this in public.”
I grinned. “Things change, honey.”
The skies were a beautiful blue on Saturday morning. Melissa’s magnificent brunch display was set up by caterers, and I observed from my kitchen window. There were flowers. They frosted the champagne. And then the first visitors showed in, all of them immaculately dressed.
I waited until phones were out and mimosas were being lifted for a group selfie, and I timed it just so.
I came out with my wash basket at that point.
“Morning, ladies!” With a joyful cry, I put down my basket full with the brightest, most gaudy things I could find.
Melissa’s smile froze in place as her head turned toward me. “Diane! What a…astonishment. You typically wash laundry throughout the week, don’t you?
I giggled and hung up a bright green beach towel. “Well, I’m adaptable now. In that sense, retirement is fantastic.
The women at the table looked at each other while I hung one item after another: the vibrant Hawaiian shirts Tom had adored, the leopard print leggings, the hot pink “Hot Mama” robe, and my kids’ SpongeBob bedding.
“You know,” a friend of Melissa’s stage whispered, “it’s really ruining the aesthetic of our photos.”
I said, “That’s so unfortunate,” taking particular care to place the robe squarely in their camera line. “Almost as unfortunate as having to rewash four loads of laundry because of barbecue smoke.”
Melissa sprang up suddenly, her face heated. “Ladies, let’s move to the other side of the yard.”
However, the harm had already been done. I could hear the rumors and whispers as they moved:
“Did she say barbecue smoke?”
“Melissa, are you feuding with your widowed neighbor?”
“That’s not very community-minded…”
I hummed loudly enough for them to hear while I suppressed my smile and carried on hanging the laundry.
Melissa marched to the gate as the brunch ended earlier than planned. I could see up close that her flawless makeup was insufficient to cover up the strain in her face.
She growled, “Was that really necessary?”
“Was what necessary?”
“You know exactly what you’re doing.”
“Yes, I do. As if your strategic barbecue was something you knew exactly what you were doing.”
“That’s different—”
“Is it? Since we’re both just “enjoying our yards,” as far as I can see. Neighbors are supposed to do that, right?
Hearing her own words hurled back at her caused her eyes to tighten. “Every week, my pals visit here. These events hold significance for me.
“I also place a lot of importance on my laundry regimen. Melissa, it’s not only about cutting utility costs. It has to do with memory. When I brought my babies home from the hospital, that clothesline was there. When my husband was still living, it was here.
Her cell rang. Her face hardened once more as she looked down at it. “Anyway. Please be aware that I lost followers today because of your little laundry show.
I couldn’t resist calling after her as she hurried away: “That’s unfortunate! Perhaps we should coordinate our colors for next week.
I ensured that my brightest laundry appeared at breakfast for three Saturdays in a row. Melissa’s guest list had significantly shrunk by the third week.
Eleanor, wearing her garden gloves, came to my side as I was putting up a particularly bright tie-dyed sheet.
“Half the neighborhood is placing bets on how long this standoff will last,” she remarked, laughing.
The final clothespin was fastened by me. “For however long it takes. She has the same right to her breakfasts as I do to my clothesline, and I just want her to see me.
I watched my laundry dance in the breeze while swinging on my porch after Eleanor left. I was reminded of the prayer flags Tom and I had seen on our vacation to New Mexico years prior by the vibrant colors against the beautiful sky.
He had admired their movement in the wind, conveying prayers and desires to the highest heavens.
It wasn’t until Melissa was standing at the base of my porch stairs that I realized she was coming since I was so engrossed in the memory.
“Can we talk?” she said in a professional, clipped voice.
I pointed to the vacant chair next to me. “Have a seat.”
She was still standing with her arms crossed. “I would like to inform you that I have shifted my breakfasts indoors. “Happy now?”
“Melissa, I didn’t mean to spoil your brunches. All I was doing was laundry.
“On the mornings of Saturdays? By coincidence?”
“About as coincidental as your barbecues starting every time my whites hit the line.”
Two women who were too obstinate to give up, we gazed at one another for a considerable amount of time.
“I hope you enjoy your victory and your tacky clothesline,” she added at last.
After saying that, she pivoted and strode back to her home.
“I will!” I called out to her. “Every single sunny day!”
My favorite part of the week these days is hanging clothes. I take my time setting everything up, making sure the “Hot Mama” robe is in the best possible position with the most sunshine.
One Saturday morning, Eleanor came to work with me and gave me clothespins.
She pointed to Melissa’s yard, where the patio was empty with the curtains shut, and asked, “Have you noticed?” “She hasn’t fired up that grill in weeks.”
I adjusted a bright yellow sheet and grinned. “Oh, yes!”
Have you also observed that she hardly has time to glance at you? She virtually ran back inside the mailbox yesterday when she spotted you approaching, I promise.
I chuckled as I recalled Melissa cradling her letters to her chest and running off as if I were carrying something more hazardous than fabric softener.
As I pinned up the final sock, I remarked, “Some people just can’t handle losing,” “Especially to a woman with a clothesline and the patience to use it.”
Later, while enjoying a glass of iced tea on my porch swing, I noticed Melissa looking through her blinds. She scowled deeply as our eyes locked, then opened the slat to close.
Still, I lifted my glass toward her.
All of this would have been so much fun for Tom. “That’s my Diane… never needed more than a clothesline and conviction to make her point!” he would add, and I could practically feel his hand on my shoulder and hear his deep laugh.
Some battles aren’t really about winning or losing, in actuality. When the smoke clears, they’re about standing your ground and letting the world know that sometimes the most impactful statement you can make is just leaving your clothes to dry, especially if it’s a neon pink robe with the words “#1 HOT MAMA” printed across the back.
Here’s another tale: We purchased our ideal house since it had views of the beach, but the nefarious neighbor used our yard for her party. She didn’t rely on our patience and assumed we would remain silent.
