Meeting the neighbours

[ro2935]

At 4am this morning a alarm started ringing, I thought it was a car alarm further down the street so ignored it. A few minutes latter my next door neighbour phones me asking if I had a house key to our elderly neighbours as her burgular alarm is ringing and she can't find her spare key.

A quick bathroom visit for me and I then grab my spare keys and go outside to meet 5 other neighbours all in night clothes and bathrobes. I unlocks the front door only to discover Dorothy [our elderly neighbour] has got a security chain on her door and her elderly dog is also at the back of the door and is barking loudly.

As we can't get in we have to phone the police and after giving the dispatcher full details they decide we may need an ambulance as well. So we wait and wait and wait and no police so one neighbour decides we need a bolt cutter, which is used with great sucess.

2 neighbours checked downstairs incase of a break in and I go up the stairs calling out all the time, checks her bathroom and then the spareroom in case she has had a fall, nothing, with dread I pushed her bedroom door open and sees Dorothy in bed, I'm still calling her and getting no response, so I reached out and touched her hand and her eyes flew open [i'm not too sure who was more frightened at that moment me or her].

Neighbours husband get the alarm code and turns the alarm off and we reassure her that she isn't under home invasion [well not quite]. I go downstairs to make some tea and to phone the dispatcher to cancel emergency services as a ambulance draws up to the house, the ambulance crew radio dispatch that no futher assistance is required and leave. It took 23 minutes for the ambulance to arrive after the initial phone call and the police never turned up.

Today I met two young couples who I was only on smiling aquaitance, I particpated in breaking and entry with 2 of them and couldn't have been prouder that they cared enough to stand outside a 80 year old single ladys home in the rain in case she needed help.

I have suggested the next time we have an improntu pyjama party in the street we have wine, cake and some chilli.

Oh and Dorothy is fine she was a lttle tearful at first and she says she feels a little silly for causing so much fuss, I told her it take a special person to bring people out into the street at 4am and next time can we be better dressed for a street party.

[Virginia]

Glad it turned out this way. However, you have to wonder if some of our elderly don't need to be alone, and so "locked" in. Been nice to have quicker response from the public servents.

[Mt_Rider]

Oh this SO sounds like the sort of thing that would happen in my life. I read it to DH cuz I love happy endings and wow, great neighborhood, huh? Y'all will never forget this nite.

 

Long ago, a friend bought a house in a typical suburban area and two of us moved in with her. Three of us friends from college days. On the very first nite, a fire started in the tongue-n-groove wood panels of the attic [my new bedroom, actually] One of the folks helping us move in left a small fan running...too close to the curtains.

 

New owner of the home ran to the neighbors on the left to use their phone to call for fire dept. [way before the day of cell phones]. After a bit, she sent me to call her night job to say she wouldn't be there. I walked in to the house on the right calling: Can I use your phone again? By then the fire trucks were doing their thing and saving the house with only minor damage so the folks knew where I'd come from even tho M. had gone to the other next door house.

 

From then on, everyone in the new neighborhood knew the three young ladies living in that house that almost burned that night.

 

MtRider [remembering The ....Housewarming! ]

[themartianchick]

What a relief that it wasn't something more serious! You and your neighbors sure are blessings to eachother.

[Herbwifemama]

I'm so glad Dorothy was all right, and you have way with people too, the way you reassured her.

 

We moved here last year, and I've gotten to know the people on our street- we're definitely the new kids, as the people who have lived here the shortest besides us have been here 15 years. And the rest of them have been here... oh 30+ years. Anyway, they have been so welcoming of us. I have needed help on two occasions, and been helped without question. The first time, a bee flew up my dress (I'm not allergic, but I"m terrified of bees), and I'd been stung 7 times (it was a bumblebee, not a honeybee). I asked if I could get the dress off and get the bee out, and I warned her I was completely naked. She called to her husband to help- I suppose I overwhelmed her a bit, and he walked in when I had just stripped off my dress. He was a gentleman however, and turned around again. Then he held my baby while she checked me over for stings (In another room) and they walked me home. I was so grateful, and never more embarrassed! I brought them homemade applesauce and zucchini bread the next day.

 

The other time, my 5yo locked me out of my house, and I wasn't sure how to get back in- I was ready to toss a brick through a basement window, but neighbor talked me out of it- I couldn't get a hold of my husband, so she let me in to use her phone and bathroom, and we chatted for a couple hours til my dh came home.

 

My mom said, "you sure have an interesting way of meeting the neighbors." Yeah mom.