Paranoia, the Destroyer

I live on Hough’s Neck -- a section of Quincy, Massachusetts. I’ve likely mentioned this a bazillion and one half times already.

When we moved here from Cambridge (East Cambridge and that’s Massachusetts, not England. duh.) we had a wee bit of culture shock. We were just one town south of the city but it felt as though we were light years and eons away.

Whyzat? Is it because we now had to drive to work versus walk? Our needing to get in the car to do a big grocery shop, pick up our meds at the pharmacy, indulge our book store addictions? No one down here dresses in all black all the damned time (‘cept me. *cough*)?

Well yeah, those bits certainly added to the we-live-in-the-middle-of-nowhere-now-but-it-sure-is-a-beautiful-nowhere-isn’t-it feeling but there’s more.

Everyone, all our neighbors, ones we know and ones we’ve not yet met, are friendly as hell (and, as you all know, Hell is quite the party. Convivial plus!). As soon as we drive onto the Neck, folks doing yard work, sitting on their front porch and/or unloading bags from their cars, stop and wave as we motor past.

For reals. It's way awesome!

The place is mega safe too.

On a couple of summer mornings I came downstairs to a jarring surprise --  one or two of the front window screens were torn, as though a burglar had punched through in a break in attempt. Nothing was missing but The Amazing Bob and I panicked all the same and got the cops here. Jen and Oni put up fliers around the neighborhood, telling others what happened and that windows should be shut and locked at night until the bandit was caught.

The third time this happened, I caught our thief in the act. Rocky the Raccoon. He’d just stopped in to snag some of Coco’s dinner -- guess the porch visiting cat beasties hadn’t left anything for him from their evening meals.

Heh. Oops. We were clearly still strong with the city living paranoia.

On a trike ride just last week I came upon a joint whose dwellers are even stronger with the delusions of danger.

At right. You know, I totally get why some of the big new fancy shmancy houses around here have alarm systems. While the Neck is all cozy,  snugly under the wing-like, some of these fresh up mansion-ettes, sitting amongst the rest of us in our bantam, Lilliputian cottages, may seem like targets.

To whom though? Taller raccoons?

In any case, this house is even smaller than ours, not right on the water and modest appearing by nearly anyone’s lights. So why the Fort Knox treatment? My first thought was, naturally, drug den/warehouse. My second thought was ‘whoa dudes, way to make yourselves a target!’ With all this fortification it just seems obvious that there’s something worth nicking in there.

Or the owners have a nasty ass case of Paranoid Personality Disorder.

Poor dears.

Destroyer -- Kinks