Neither a borrower nor a lender be, For loan oft loses both itself and friend, And borrowing dulls the edge of husbandry (Shakespeare’s Hamlet).
I live in a tiny house in the middle of a small compound in the middle of nowhere. So tiny that some would say I need to go outside to change my mind. I haven’t had occasion to meet many of my neighbours with the exception of a wonderful old man who solicits lifts from me into and from town. The trip to town is benign. On the return-trip I have a hard time staying sober from the alcohol fumes alone. I would say the cornerstone of our relationship is alcohol and loans (from me to him).
There have been several attempts to make the house more liveable over the years, starting with basic wiring in conduits (or conducts as the electrician corrected me), a kitchen (I was tickled pink when the engineer tried to tell me how to lay it out; yes cooking and engineering same thing he said), and the pièce de résistance a new bathroom.
The bathroom is significant. It meant my better proportioned friends no longer had to walk in sideways. It also meant I could have a marvellous view of dunes and grasslands and Tarquin, the resident waterbuck. While my better proportioned friends got what they wanted, I lucked out. Between the engineer and the builder my view is confined to the black sky, or blue during the day-time, because of the location of the bath and the height and angle of the windows in relation to it. I believe the engineer said he was trying to protect my modesty by limiting views from the other houses into the bathroom.
One fine day my usually drunk neighbour asked for yet another loan. I declined on the basis that the last few were past due. He dutifully arrived at my house a day or so later to make the repayment. He knocked on all the doors to no avail, so he did what any self-respecting debt re-payer would do. He peeked in the bathroom window. I am not sure who got more of a fright; me, when I turned to see lips, a flattened nose and peering eyes pressed to the window, or he, when he saw me in the nick on the toilet seat.
I am told he has been sober one hundred days now. The engineer however has yet to respond to my note “Dear Engineer, houses don’t peer – people do. Love Terri”.