The pool is in the inventory of things I own and care about. It has produced over twelve years of summer evenings and weekend afternoons, and the particular pleasure of having cold water available on hot days. That is a return no spreadsheet could capture.
Sandra Fielding moved into the house directly adjacent to mine, sharing my eastern fence line, nine years after I bought my house. She moved in with two young children and a set of opinions about the neighborhood that quickly became apparent to everyone within earshot.
Sandra was not a subtle person.
A preference for my pool was expressed approximately three months after she moved in. She came to my door on a Saturday morning in June, wondering if I would mind if her children used the pool "occasionally." I agreed to occasional, supervised access.
The word occasionally was doing a lot of work in that sentence.
What I understood by occasionally was once every couple of weeks. What Sandra understood was significantly more frequent.
The Escalation Timeline:
-
July: Four days a week.
-
August: Five days a week, plus guests (her sister, nieces, and a rotating cast of strangers).
-
September: Seventeen documented occasions of unauthorized use while I was not home, using a gate key she had somehow obtained.